THREE CENTURIES
OF
Southern Poetry
(1607-1907)
CARL HOLLIDAY, M.A.
Professor of English Literature, Cox College, Atlanta. Author of
A History of Southern Literature, The Cotton-
Picker and Other Poems, Etc.
NASHVILLE, TENN.; DALLAS, TEX.
PUBLISHING HOUSE OF THE M. E. CHURCH, SOUTH
SMITH & LAMAR, AGENTS
COPYRIGHT, 1908,
By ....
SMITH £VLJvifAx.;; .:
Ota
THAT MOST PUEASANT OF MEN
AND MOST ZEALOUS OF TEACHERS,
Ir.
M147636
PREFACE.
WITHIN the last decade the interest in Southern literature
has become widespread. Nearly every Southern college and
university now offers a course in the subject, and the summer
schools and Chautauquas frequently make it a special feature.
All this is as it should be. There nre Southern writers scarce
ly known by name to-day who are deserving of careful atten
tion. Especially is this true among the Southern poets, who,
amidst prosperity and adversity, have sung songs of gladness
and of sorrow that stand among the finest productions in
American literature. How few of them are intimately, lov
ingly known at the present day !
This collection is made in the hope that still further in
terest may be aroused. Other collections have been made,
but they have dealt almost entirely with the poets living in
the first sixty years of the nineteenth century. In the present
compilation specimens are given from three centuries of
Southern verse — from 1607 to 1907. Because of this fact
the book, it is hoped, will be of interest not only to students
of literature, but also to students of history and to lovers of
the old and curious in general.
In the preparation of this work many courtesies have been
extended to me. To the publishers and holders of copyrights
whose kind permission to use selections has been granted me,
I make grateful acknowledgments. My special thanks are due
Dr. W. P. Trent, of Columbia University, Dr. William H.
Browne, of Johns Hopkins University, Mrs. Janey Hope
Marr, of Blacksburg, Va., Messrs. Brentano, of New York,
and B. F. Johnson Publishing Company, the authorized pub
lishers of Timrod's poems. Without their help this volume
could not have reached its present form.
CARL HOLLIDAY.
Cox College, Atlanta.
(5)
CONTENTS.
i.
THE BEGINNINGS.
(1607-1740.)
R. RICH, GENT -^
Newes from Virginia ij
JOHN SMITH (1579-1631) 19
The Sea Mark I9
GEORGE SANDYS ( 1578-1644) 20
Procne's Revenge 21
GEORGE ALSOP ( 1638-16—) 22
Upon a Purple Cap 22
ANONYMOUS 23
Bacon's Epitaph ( 1676) 23
EBENEZER COOK 25
The Sot-Weed Factors 25
He Meets a Quaker 2^
He Goes to Court 26
II.
THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD.
(1740-1815.)
ANONYMOUS ^o
Virginia Hearts of Oak 3O
CHARLES HENRY WHARTON (1748- ) 3I
The Eulogy of George Washington 32
HUGH HENRY BRACKENRIDGE (1748-1816) 32
Warren's Last Words 3^
From "The Death of General Montgomery" 34
ST. GEORGE TUCKER (1752-1828) 34
Days of My Youth ss
(7)
8
CONTENTS.
PAGE.
WILLIAM MUNFORD ( 1775-1825) 36
The Triumph of Hector 36
JOHN SHAW ( 1778-1809) 38
Song 38
WASHINGTON ALLSTON (1779-1843) 39
Immortality 39
On the Late S. T. Coleridge 40
FRANCIS SCOTT KEY (1779-1843) 40
The Star-Spangled Banner 41
WILLIAM MAXWELL ( 1784-1857) 43
To a Fair Lady 43
To Anne 43
RICHARD DABNEY (1787-1825) 44
An Epigram Imitated from Archias 44
Youth and Age 45
III.
THE PERIOD OF EXPANSION.
(1815-1850.)
RICHARD HENRY WILDE ( 1789-1847) 50
Stanzas 50
To the Mocking Bird 51
A Farewell to America 51
MTRABEAU BONAPARTE LAMAR ( 1708-1859) 53
The Daughter of Mendoza 53
EDWARD COATE PINKNEY ( 1802-1825) 54
A Health 55
Votive Song 55
A Serenade 57
GEORGE DENISON PRENTICE (1802-1870) 57
Lines to a Lady 58
The Closing Year 58
WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS (1806-1870) 61
The Grapevine Swing 62
The Lost Pleiad 62
Song in March 64
CONTENTS.
PAGE.
EDGAR ALLAN POEI ( 1809-1849) 65
Israfel 67
The Bells 69
Annabel Lee 72
The Raven 73
To One in Paradise 79
The Conqueror Worm 80
ALBERT PIKE (1809-1891) 82
To the Mocking Bird 82
To Spring 84
Every Year 86
ALEXANDER BEAUFORT MEEK (1814-1865) 88
Land' of the South 88
The Mocking Bird 90
PHILIP PENDLETON COOKE ( 1816-1850) 92
Florence Vane 92
SEVERN TEACKLE WALLIS (1816-1894) 94
The Blessed Hand 94
AMELIA WELBY (1819-1852) 97
Twilight at Sea 97
To a Seashell 97
THEODORE O'HARA (1820-1867) 98
The Bivouac of the Dead 98
IV.
THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD.
(1850-1875.)
PLANTATION MELODIES 107
Mourner's Song 108
Roll, Jordan, Roll 108
Heaven jog
Swing Low, Sweet Chariot 109
The Dead 109
In de Mornin' no
Savannah Freeman's Song no
Lay Dis Body Down in
Stars Begin to Fall.. . m
10 CONTENTS.
PAGE.
CIVIL WAR SONGS in
Call All 112
The Bonnie Blue Flag 113
The Soldier Boy 115
MARGARET PRESTON ( 1820-1897) 116
Calling the Angels In 1 16
The Hero of the Commune 1 18
The Shade of the Trees 1 19
A Grave in Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond 120
There'll Come a Day 122
FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR (1822-1874) 122
Little Giffen 123
Virginians of the Valley 124
JOHN REUBEN THOMPSON (1823-1873) 125
Music in Camp 126
The Battle Rainbow 128
JAMES MATHEWES LEGARE ( 1823-1859) 130
Ahab Mohammed 130
To a Lily 132
JAMES BARRON HOPE ( 1827-1887) 133
From "Arms and the Man" 133
From "The Charge at Balaklava" • 136
Three Summer Studies 137
Sunset on Hampton Roads 140
HENRY TIMROD (1829-1867) 141
Sonnet 142
The Summer Bower 143
Carolina 145
The Cotton Boll 147
PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE (1830-1886) 152
Lyric of Action 154
Aethra 155
My Study 156
The Mocking Bird 156
The Pine's Mystery 157
October 158
CONTENTS.
PAGE.
JAMES RYDER RANDALL (1839-1908) 158
Maryland 159
ABRAM JOSEPH RYAN (1839-1886) 161
The Conquered Banner 162
Night Thoughts 164
The Sword of Robert Lee 165
Song of the Mystic 166
V.
THE NEW SOUTH.
(1875-1907.)
SIDNEY LANIER ( 1842-1881 ) 173
A Ballad of Trees and the Master 175
The Marshes of Glynn 175
Song of the Chattahoochee 180
JOHN HENRY BONER ( 1845- ) 182
Poe's Cottage at Fordham 182
The Light'ood Fire 184
JOHN BANISTER TABB ( 1845- ) 185
The Half-Ring Moon 185
My Star 186
GEORGE HERBERT SASS ( 1845- ) 186
In a King-Cambyses Vein 186
CARLYLE McKiNLEY ( 1847-1904) 188
Sapelo 189
WILL HENRY THOMPSON (1848- ) 191
The High Tide at Gettysburg 191
ROBERT BURNS WILSON ( 1850- ) 194
Dedication 194
The Death of Winter 195
IRWIN RUSSELL ( 1853-1879) 196
Christmas Night in the Quarters 197
SAMUEL MINTURN PECK ( 1854- ) 206
Bessie Brown, M.D 207
The Captain's Feather 208
The Grapevine Swing 209
Phyllis 210
CONTENTS.
PAGE.
WILLIAM HAMILTON HAYNE ( 1856- ) 212
The Yule Log 212
Sleep and His Brother Death 212
FRANK L. STANTON ( 1857- ) 213
Comes One with a Song 213
Light on the Hills 214
HENRY JEROME STOCKARD ( 1858- ) -. 215
Homer 216
YATES SNOWDEN ( 1858- ) 216
A Carolina Bourbon 217
DANSKE DANDRIDGE ( 1859- ) 219
The Dead Moon 220
The Spirit and the Wood Sparrow 222
BENJAMIN SLEDD ( 1864- ) 223
The Children 223
MADISON CAWEIN ( 1865- ) 224
The Whippoorwill 224
Disenchantment of Death 225
Love and a Day 227
LlZETTE WOODWORTH REESE (1856- ) 228
In Sorrow's Hour 228
WALTER MALONE ( 1866- ) 229
A Portrait of Henry Timrod 229
NOTES 231
BIBLIOGRAPHY 260
INDEX 263
I.
THE BEGINNINGS.
(1607-1740.)
GENERAL SURVEY.
IN the hundred and thirty years included between
the dates 1607 and 1740 we find a period of wonderful
events. A vast, unknown continent was entered; a
wilderness was conquered; a unique type of civiliza
tion was founded; and, amid heroic endeavors and
untold suffering, a new nation had advanced to that
stage where it could no longer remain subordinate
to another. There was an admirable energy in the
characters of these pioneers, and the story of their
onward march is epic in itself; but the fact must be
recognized that such a form of life could not be con
ducive to the production, at that time, of literature
and of the fine arts in general. Strenuous labor and
ever-present hardships left but little time and less in
clination for the higher, subtler, and more refined
phases of life.
Yet in the South, as well as in the North, there
were some efforts toward literary expression. Crude
they may have been; yet they should be remembered
as prophecies, if for nothing else, of greater things
to come. In the early years of the period the writings
were full of wonder; men had never before seen such
vastness in nature. But in the latter years we find a
great earnestness and even a bitterness pervading the
literature. Bacon's Rebellion had roused the people,
and now America was in the midst of what John
05)
l;6 .".'tHPEB CElJTTttelES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Fiske has called "the century of political education/'
extending from 1676 to 1776. All this is seen most
clearly in the prose of the period ; but here and there
it may be traced in the poetry also.
R. RICH, GENT.
Scarcely anything is known about this writer. It
is not even certain that this was his true name. Ac
cording to his own statement he was "one of the
voyage" to Virginia in 1609, and it is believed that he
returned to England during the next year. His Newes
from Virginia, extracts from which are given here,
was published in 1610.
NEWES FROM VIRGINIA
Of the happy arrival of that famous and worthy knight, Sir
Thomas Gates, and well reputed and valiant Captaine New
port into England.
It is no idle fabulous tale, nor is it fayned newes :
For Truth herself is heere arriv'd, because you
should not muse.
With her both Gates and Newport come, to tell
Report doth lye,*
Which did devulge unto the world, that they at sea
did dye.
5 The seas did rage, the windes did blowe, distressed
were they then;
Their ship did leake, her tacklings break, in daun-
ger were her men.
But heaven may pylotte in this storme, and to an
iland nere,
Bermoothawes call'd, conducted them, which did
abate their fears.
To kill these swyne, to yield them foode that little
had to eate,
(-7)
1 8 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
10 Their store was spent, and all things scant, alas!
they wanted meate.
A thousand hogges that dogge did kill, their hunger
to sustaine,
And with such foode did in that ile two and forty
weekes remaine.
And so unto Virginia came, where these brave sol
diers finde
The English-men opprest with greife and discon
tent in minde.
15 They seem'd distracted and forlorne, for those two
worthyes losse,
Yet at their hoine returne they joyd, amongst them
some were crosse.
Where they unto their labour fall, as men that
meane to thrive,
Let's pray that heaven may blesse them all, and
keep them long alive.
Those men that vagrants liv'd with us, have there
deserved well ;
20 Their governour writes in their praise, as divers
letters tel.
And to th' adventurers thus he writes be not dis-
may'd at all,
For scandall cannot doe us wrong, God will not
let us fall.
Let England knowe our willingness, for that our
worke is goode
Wee hope to plant a nation, where none before hath
stood.*
25 The number of adventurers, that are for this plan
tation,
Are full eight hundred worthy men, some noble,
all of fashion.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 19
Good, discreete, their worke is good, and as they
have begun,
May Heaven assist them in their worke, and thus
our newes is done.
JOHN SMITH.
Captain John Smith's fame is so great that a de
tailed account of his life is unnecessary here. He was
born at Willoughby, England, and, according to his
own statements, passed through many thrilling and
romantic adventures in his youth. He reached Amer
ica in April, 1607, and immediately became the leading
spirit in the colonizing movements. A most versatile
man, he undertook any task that was placed before
him— building houses, hunting, governing men, ex
ploring- the wilderness, drawing maps, writing books,
fighting Indians, organizing new colonies, and even
essaying poetry. His last years were spent in England,
where he was considered an authority in all matters
connected with the New World. He died in London
in 1631. The selection given here was published in
that year.
THE SEA MARK.
(Advertisements* for the unexperienced planters of New
England.)
Aloof, aloof, and come no near.
The dangers do appear
Which, if my ruin had not been,
You had not seen:
20 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
5 I only lie upon this shelf
To be a mark to all
Which on the same might fall,
That none may perish but myself.
If in or outward you be bound,
10 Do not forget to sound;
Neglect of that was cause of this
To steer amiss.
The seas were calm, the wind was fair,
That made me so secure
15 That now I must endure
All weathers, be they foul or fair.
The winter's cold, the summer's heat,
Alternatively beat
Upon my bruised sides, that rue,
20 That no relief can ever come:
But why should I despair,
Being promised so fair
That there shall be a day of Doom?
GEORGE SANDYS.
(1578-1644.)
The first genuine piece of literature written in
America was George Sandys's translation of Ovid's*
Metamorphoses, a work of such merit as to receive
hearty praise from Dryden and Pope. Sandys was
born of a noble and influential family and was edu
cated at Oxford. Before his appointment as treas
urer of the Virginia Company, in 1621, he had pub
lished the first five books of his translation of Ovid,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 21
and upon his departure for the New World he was
urged by many men of note to continue the task till
finished. Here, in the rude wilderness and during
one of the bloodiest massacres in all colonial history,
he wrote the remainder of the poem, having, to use
his own words, "wars and tumults to bring it to light
instead of the Muses." These ten books appeared in
1626. Sandys died in Kent, England, in the spring
of 1644.
PROCNE'S REVENGE.
(Procne, avenging the unfaithfulness of her husband, King
Tereus, slays and prepares for his table their own beloved
son. After eating heartily, the king calls for his little boy,
Itys.)
Procne could not disguise her cruel joy,
In full fruition of her horrid ire,
Thou hast, said she, within thee thy desire.
He looks about, asks where ; and while again
5 He asks and calls, all bloody with the slain,
Forth like a Fury, Philomela flew
And at his face the head of Itys threw ;
Nor ever more than now desired a tongue
To express the joy of her revenged wrong.
10 He with loud outcries doth the board repel,
And calls the Furies from the depths of hell ;
Now tears his breast, and strives from thence in
vain
To pull the abhorred food ; now weeps amain
And calls himself his son's unhappy tomb;
15 Then draws his sword and through the guilty room
Pursues the sisters who appear with wings
To cut the air ; and so they did. One sings
In woods; the other near the house remains
And on her breast yet bears her murder's stains.
22 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
20 He, swift with grief and fury, in that space
His person changed. Long tufts of feathers grace
His shining crown; his sword a bill became;
His face all armed; whom we a lapwing name.
GEORGE ALSOP.
(1638-16—.)
George Alsop emigrated from England to Mary
land in 1658 and remained there for five years. He
wrote an interesting account of his experiences in
America, which was published in 1666 under the title,
A Character of the Province of Mary-Land. The se
lection given is from this work which, however, is,
for the most part, in prose. Of Alsop's life after his
return to England scarcely anything is known.
UPON A PURPLE CAP.*
Hail from the dead, or from Eternity,
Thou Velvet Religue of Antiquity;
Thou which appear'st here in thy purple hue,
Tell's how the dead within their tombs do do ;
5 How those ghosts fare within each marble cell,
Where amongst them for ages thou didst dwell.
What brain didst cover there ? Tell us that we
Upon our knees vail hats to honor thee ;
And if no honor's due, tell us whose pate
10 Thou basely coveredst, and we'll jointly hate !
Let's know his name, that we may show neglect ;
If otherwise, we'll kiss thee with respect.
Say, didst thou cover Noll's * old brazen head,
Which on the top of Westminster * high lead
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 23
15 Stands on a pole, erected to the sky,
As a grand trophy to his memory?
From his perfidious skull didst thou fall down
In a disdain to honor such a crown
With three-pile velvet?* Tell me, hadst thou thy
fall
20 From the high top of that Cathedral?
BACON'S EPITAPH.
(1676.)
The first literary result of Bacon's Rebellion was
the Burwell Papers, so named because of the family
in whose possession the manuscript so long remained.
Although written in 1676, it was not widely known
until 1814, when the Massachusetts Historical Society
published it. Opening in the midst of a description
of an Indian fight (for the first pages are lost), the
story tells of the savage atrocities, the plea to Bacon
to lead the people, the war and his brave career in
it, his sad and mysterious death, the deceitful endeav
ors of his worthless successor, Ingram, and, through
it all, the admiration and love for the heroic leader.
The writer is not known. The body of the book is in
prose, but near the close is found the following selec
tion:
Death, why so cruel ? What ! No other way
To manifest thy spleen,* but thus to slay
Our hopes of safety, liberty, our all,
Which, through thy tyranny, with him must fall
5 To its late chaos?
24 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Now we must complain.
Since thou, in him, hast more than thousand slain,
Whose lives and safeties did so much depend
On him their life, with him their lives must end.
10 Who now must heal those wounds, or stop that
blood
The Heathen made, and drew into a flood ?
Who is't must plead our cause? Nor trump nor
drum
Nor Deputations ; these, alas ! are dumb
And cannot speak. Our Arms (though ne'er so
strong)
15 Will want the aid of his commanding tongue
Which conquer'd more than Caesar. He o'erthrew
Only the outward frame; this could subdue
The rugged works of nature. Souls replete
With dull chill cold, he'd animate with heat
20 Drawn forth of reason's limbic. In a word,
Mars* and Minerva* both in him concurred
For art, for arms, whose pen and sword alike,
As Cato's* did, may admiration strike
Into his foes ; while they confess withal
25 It was their guilt styl'd him a criminal.
Only this difference does from truth proceed ;
They in the guilt, he in the name must bleed.
While none shall dare his obsequies to sing
In deserv'd measures; until time shall bring
30 Truth crown'd with freedom, and from danger free
To sound his praises to posterity.
Here let him rest ; while we this truth report
He's gone from hence unto a higher Court
To plead his cause, where he by this doth know
35 Whether to Cresar he was friend or foe.*
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 25
EBENEZER COOK.
In 1708 there was published in London a satirical
poem, entitled The Sot-Weed Factor. It had the sig
nature "Eben. Cook, Gent. ;" but doubtless this is only
a pen name. The book tells the adventures of an
English merchant in Virginia, especially with those
persons who dealt in tobacco, or sot-weed, as it was
then sometimes called. We may feel sure that the
poem was not very popular in America.
THE SOT-WEED FACTORS.
With neither stocking, hat, nor shoe,
These sot-weed planters crowd the shore,
In hue as tawny as a Moor.
Figures so strange, no good designed
5 To be a part of human kind ;
But wanton nature, void of rest,
Moulded the brittle clay in jest.
HE MEETS A QUAKER.
I met a Quaker, "Yea" and "Nay" ;
A pious, conscientious rogue,*
10 As e'er wore bonnet or a brogue,
Who neither swore* nor kept his word
But cheated in the fear of God;
And when his debts he would not pay,
By light within* he ran away.
15 With this sly zealot soon I struck
A bargain for my English truck,
Agreeing for ten thousand weight*
Of Sot- weed good and fit for freight,
26 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Broad Oronooko* bright and sound,
20 The growth and product of his ground ;
In cask that should contain complete
Five hundred of tobacco neat.
The contract thus betwixt us made,
Not well acquainted with the trade,
25 My goods I trusted to the cheat,
Whose crop was then aboard the fleet ;
And, going to receive my own,
I found the bird was newly flown.
HE GOES TO COURT.
We sat, like others, on the ground,
30 Carousing punch in open air,
Till crier did the court declare:
And straight the lawyers broke the peace.
Wrangling for plaintiff and defendant.
I thought they ne'er would make an end on't.
35 With nonsense, stuff, and false quotations,
With brazen lies and allegations.
And in the splitting of the cause,
They used such motions with their paws,
As showed their zeal was strongly bent
40 In blows to end the argument.
II.
THE REVOLUTIONARY PERIOD.
(1740-1815.)
GENERAL SURVEY.
We now enter a period of war and not of poetry.
The greatest poetry of this time was written in blood
on the snowy fields of Valley Forge. It was a time
when the thoughts of all Americans were turned
toward the study of the common rights of man, the
institutions of government, and the theory of law in
general. Sentiment vented itself in oratory and finally
in action, and only occasionally did some quieter soul
express itself in verse. In the South especially this
was true. The courthouse was the center of interest,
and there eloquence was demanded. Moreover, the
opportunities for publishing were very meager. We
have seen that nearly all the poetry given so far was
printed in England; and this custom continued far
into the Revolutionary period. Governor Berkeley
had made his memorable statement: "I thank God
there are no free schools nor printing, and I hope we
shall not have them these hundred years." From
1729 until near the Revolution there was but one
printing press in Virginia, and that one was under
official control; while the first newspaper, The Vir
ginia Gazette, was not published until 1736. This,
then, was the soil from which poetry must spring.
Yet we find not a few striking pieces of verse.
VIRGINIA HEARTS OF OAK.
Among the few Revolutionary songs written in the
South one of the most famous was the Carolina bal
lad, Battle of King's Mountain (1781), beginning
with the lines :
'Twas on a pleasant mountain
The Tory heathen lay,
With a doughty major at their head,
One Ferguson, they say.
Cornwallis had detached him,
A thieving for to go,
And catch the Carolina men,
Or bring the rebels low.
Another well-known one was Virginia Hearts of
Oak, portions of which are given here. Of course
other poems were known, especially some by Rednap
Howell, a North Carolina schoolmaster, the patriot
ism of which was far better than the technique. A
Virginia woman wrote a poem about Tea — "perni
cious, baleful tea:"
"With all Pandora's ills possessed;
Hyson, no more beguiled by thee,
My noble sons shall be oppressed."
However, Virginia Hearts of Oak was doubtless
the most popular :
Sure never was picture drawn more to the life,
Or affectionate husband more fond of his wife,
Than America copies and loves Britain's sons,*
Who, conscious of freedom, are bold as great guns.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 31
5 Hearts of oak are we still,
For we're sons of those men
Who always are ready-
Steady, boys, steady-
To fight for their freedom again and again.
10 To King George, as true subjects, we loyal bow
down,
But hope we may call Magna Charta* our own :
Let the rest of the world slavish worship decree,
Great Britain has ordered her sons to be Free!
Hearts of oak, etc.
15 With Loyalty, Liberty let us entwine,
Our blood shall for both flow as free as our wine ;
Let us set an example what all men should be,
And a toast give the world — Here's to those who'd
be Free!
Hearts of oak, etc.
CHARLES HENRY WHARTON.
(1748- ? .)
At a time when Washington was undergoing some
of the severest trials of his life, fighting not only the
enemy from abroad but also the fear and jealousy of
many of his own countrymen, there appeared a rather
remarkable poem in his defense, A Poetical Epistle to
George Washington (1778). It was a striking proof
of the unpopularity in England of the war that, al
though the proceeds from this book were to go to
32 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
American prisoners, fifteen thousand copies were sold
in London alone in three weeks. Wharton was a
Catholic priest, born in Maryland, but serving his
Church in England during the Revolution.
THE EULOGY OF GEORGE WASHINGTON.
Great without pomp, without ambition brave,
Proud not to conquer fellow-men, but save ;
Friend to the wretched, foe to none but those
Who plan their greatness on their brethren s woes;
5 Awed by no titles, faithless to no trust,
Free without faction, obstinately just;
Too rough for flattery, dreading e'en as death
The baneful influence of corruption s breatn ;
Warmed by Religion's sacred genuine ray
" That points to future bliss the unerring way:
Such be my country !— what her sons should be
O, may they learn, great Washington, from thee!
HUGH HENRY BRACKENRIDGE.
(1748-1816.)
Huo-h Henry Brackenridge, preacher, teacher, dram
atist, soldier, lawyer, politician, judge, poet, and
humorist, was born in Scotland, but came to America
earlv in his boyhood. Amidst cruel hardships he
secured enough education to become teacher of a
country school in Maryland, and after pursuing this
work for several years entered Princeton University,
where he also taught for a while. He returned to
Maryland and became both preacher and teacher.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 33
While there he wrote for his pupils his first drama,
The Battle of Bunker Hill (1776). In the spring of
1777 he became a chaplain in the Continental army,
and during that same year wrote his second drama,
The Death of General Montgomery. After the war
he studied law and became judge of the Supreme
Court of Pennsylvania. In 1796 he published his
popular Humorous work, Captain Farrago and Teague
O'Regan, His Servant. His dramatic work has a sur
prisingly clear and lofty style.
WARREN'S* LAST WORDS.
By the last parting breath
And blood of this your fellow-soldier slain,
Be now adjured never to yield the right —
The grand deposit of all-giving Heaven —
5 To man's free nature, that he rules himself !
Weep not for him who first espoused the cause,
And risking life, hath met the enemy
In fatal opposition — but rejoice !
For now I go to mingle with the dead, —
10 Great Brutus,* Hampden,* Sidney,* and the rest,
Of old or modern memory, who lived
A mound to tyrants, and strong hedge to kings,
Bounding the inundation of their rage
Against the happiness and peace of Man.
15 I see three heroes where they walk serene,
By crystal currents, on the vale of Heaven,
High in full converse of immortal acts
Achieved for truth and innocence on earth.
Illustrious group ! They beckon me along,
20 To ray my visage with immortal light,
3
34 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
And bind the amaranth* around my brow.
I come, I come, ye firstborn of true fame.
Fight on, my countrymen, be free, be free !
FROM "THE DEATH OF GENERAL MONTGOMERY."'
Sad thought of cruelty and outrage dire !
25 Not to be paralleled 'mongst human kind,
Save in the tales of flesh-devouring men,
The one-eyed Cyclops* and fierce Cannibal.
For what we hear of Saracen* or Turk,
Mogol* or Tartar* of Siberia,
30 Is far behind the deed of infamy
And horror mixed which Britons meditate.
And at the Last Day, when the Pit receives
Her gloomy brood, and seen among the rest,
Some spirit distinguished by ampler swell
35 Of malice, envy, and soul-griping hate,
Pointing to him, the foul and ugly ghosts
Of hell shall say— "That was an Englishman."*
ST. GEORGE TUCKER.
(1752-1828.)
One of the most popular bits of early Southern
verse was Resignation: or, Days of My Youth. Its
author, St. George Tucker, was born in Bermuda,
but early removed to Virginia. He became a brilliant
jurist and was during several years Professor of Law
at William and Mary College. Among his works are
Fugitive Stanzas, Probationary Odes of Jonathan Pin
dar, Esq., Commentary on the Constitution, Disserta-
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 35
tion on Slavery, and unpublished dramas. His poems
possess much gracefulness and purity of sentiment.
DAYS OF MY YOUTH.
Days of my youth,
Ye have glided away;
Hairs of my youth,
Ye are frosted and gray ;
5 Eyes of my youth,
^ Your keen sight is no more ;
Cheeks of my youth,
^ Ye are furrowed all o'er;
Strength of my youth,
All your vigor is gone;
Thoughts of my youth,
Your gay visions are flown.
Days of my youth,
I wish not your recall;
5 Hairs of my youth,
^ I'm content ye should fall ;
Eyes of my youth,
^ You much evil have seen ;
Cheeks of my youth,
Bathed in tears have you been ;
Thoughts of my youth,
^ You have led me astray;
Strength of my youth,
Why lament your decay?
25 Days of my age,
Ye will shortly be past ;
Pains of my age,
Yet a while ye can last;
Joys of my age,
30 In true wisdom delight;
36 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Eyes of my age,
Be religion your light;
Thoughts of my age,
Dread ye not the cold sod ;
35 Hopes of my age,
Be ye fixed on your God.
WILLIAM M UN FORD.
(1775-1825.)
During the last years of the Revolutionary period
William Munford, a Virginian, worked steadily upon
a blank verse translation of Homer's Iliad* and fin
ished it just before his death. However, it did not
appear in book form until 1846. Munford was a
graduate of William and Mary, had been a State
Senator for several years, and at the time of his death
was clerk of the House of Delegates. His volume of
original poems (1798) was considered but fair in
quality in his own day, and they are not at all known
now; but his translation of the Iliad is worthy of
wider fame.
THE TRIUMPH OF HECTOR.*
With loud, tremendous shout,
He called his Trojan heroes. Sons of Troy,*
Equestrian warriors, to the onset come !
Break now the Grecian wall, and on their ships
B Throw flaming brands like thunderbolts of Jove
He said, inspiring fury ; they his call
With transport heard throughout that numeroi
host!
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 37
Thronging together, to the wall they ran,
Armed with keen spears, before them held erect,
10 And mounting scaling ladders. Hector seized
And bore a stone which stood before the gates,
Heavy and craggy, pointed sharp at top,
Which not two men, though stoutest of the race
Earth now sustains, could without toil have moved
15 By levers from the ground and heaved its mass
Into a wagon ; yet did singly he
Toss it with ease, so light Saturnian Jove*
Made it to him ! For, as a shepherd brings
In one hand joyfully a ram's rich fleece,
20 And feels but small the weight, so Hector bore
That rock enormous toward the lofty gates,
Strong-framed, with double valves, of panels thick,
Compact and firm ; two iron bars within
Transverse secured them, fastened by a bolt.
25 He near them took his stand, with legs astride,
That -not in vain that weapon should be thrown;
Then smote them in the midst with all his strength,
And broke both hinges. Thundering on, the stone,
With force o'erwhelming, fell within the wall.
30 Loud rang the yielding gates, asunder riven,
Nor could the bars retain them ; flew the planks
In splintered fragments, scattered every way.
Into the pass illustrious Hector leaped";
Gloomy as night, with aspect stern and dread!
35 Arrayed in brazen panoply, he shone
Terrific; in his hands two javelins keen!
And surely no one could have checked him then,
Except the gods, when through those gates he
sprang !
His eyes, tremendous, flashed with living fire;
40 And, turning to his host, he called them all
To pass the barrier.
3$ THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
JOHN SHAW.
(1778-1809.)
In 1810 there appeared a little volume of verse,
entitled simply Poems, and bearing the name Dr. John
Shaw. The author had died a few months before.
Born at Annapolis, Maryland, he studied at St. John's
College in that city, and took courses in medicine at
the University of Pennsylvania and at the University
of Edinburgh. He went to Baltimore in 1805, and
there was highly successful in his profession. His
verse, while not approaching greatness, has much
daintiness.
SONG.
Who has robbed the ocean cave,
To tinge thy lips with coral hue?
Who from India's distant wave
For thee those pearly treasures drew?
5 Who from yonder orient sky
Stole the morning of thine eye ?
Thousand charms thy form to deck,
From sea, and earth, and air are torn ;
Roses bloom upon thy cheek,
10 On thy breath their fragrance borne.
Guard thy bosom from the day,
Lest thy snows should melt away.*
But one charm remains behind,
Which mute earth can ne'er impart;
15 Nor in ocean wilt thou find,
Nor in the circling air, a heart.
Fairest, wouldst thou perfect be,
Take, O take that heart from me!
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 39
WASHINGTON ALLSTON.
(1779-1843.)
Coleridge once said of Washington Allston : "He is
surpassed by no man of his age in artistic and poetic
genius." Allston was born at Georgetown, South
Carolina, was educated at Harvard, and studied paint
ing in England, France, and Italy. He became widely
known as an artist, among his best productions being
portraits of Benjamin West and Coleridge, and the
pictures, "The Angel Uriel in the Sun" and "Belshaz-
zar's Feast." He is best known to-day by his Lectures
on Art, but some of his poems are noticeable for their
vigorous expression.
IMMORTALITY.
To think for aye ; to breathe immortal breath ;
And know nor hope nor fear of ending death ;
To see the myriad worlds that round us roll
Wax old and perish, while the steadfast soul
5 Stands fresh and moveless in her sphere of thought ;
O God, omnipotent ! Who in me wrought,
This conscious world, whose ever-growing orb.
When the dead Past shall all in time absorb,
Will be but as begun — O, of thine own,
10 Give of the holy light that veils thy throne,*
That darkness be not mine, to take my place,
Beyond the reach of light, a blot in space !
So may this wondrous Life, from sin made free,
Reflect thy love for aye, and to thy glory be.
40 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
ON THE LATE S. T. COLERIDGE.*
15 And thou art gone, most loved, most honored
friend !
No, nevermore thy gentle voice* shall blend
With air of Earth its pure ideal tones,
Binding in one, as with harmonious zones,
The heart and intellect. And I no more
20 Shall with thee gaze on that unfathomed deep,
The Human Soul — as when, pushed off the shore,
Thy mystic bark would through the darkness
sweep,
Itself the while so bright! For oft we seemed
As on some starless sea — all dark above,
25 All dark below — yet, onward as we drove,
To plough up light that ever round us streamed.
But he who mourns is not as one bereft
Of all he loved : thy living Truths are left.
FRANCIS SCOTT KEY.
(1779-1843.)
It sometimes happens that one song gives a writer
lasting fame. Among several examples may be men
tioned Home, Sweet Home, The Old Oaken Bucket,
Dixie, Hail Columbia, and The Star-Spangled Ban
ner. The author of the last-named poem was born in
Frederick County, Maryland, was educated at St.
John's College, Annapolis, became a lawyer, and was
for some time Attorney for the District of Columbia.
During the second war with Great Britain he was
sent on board a British ship to arrange an exchange
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 4!
of prisoners, and, the attack on Fort McHenry having
begun, he was detained on board until the next morn
ing. When, in the early morning light, he saw the
American flag still waving above the fort, he seized
an old envelope and wrote upon its back these stirring
words. Other poems he wrote in after life; but only
this one is widely known. But he who creates one
lyric that a nation sings into its very soul has done
indeed a most glorious life work.
THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER.
O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last
gleaming—
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the
clouds of the fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly
streaming ?
' And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in
air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was
still there ;
O ! say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave ?
On that shore dimly seen through the mists of the
deep,
10 Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence re
poses,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering
steep,
As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first
beam,
In full glory reflected now shines on the stream;
42 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
15 Tis the star-spangled banner ; O long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the
brave !
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
A home and a country should leave us no more ?
20 Their blood has washed out their foul footstep's
pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the
grave ;
And the star-spangled banner jn triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the
brave.
25 O ! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desola
tion!
Blessed with victory and peace, may the Heav'n-
rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved
us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
30 And this be our motto — "In God is our trust !"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall
wave
O'er the land of the free and the Home of the
brave.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 43
WILLIAM MAXWELL.
(1784-1857.)
William Maxwell, a lawyer, teacher, editor, and
poet, was born at Norfolk, Virginia, was educated
at Yale, became a member of the Virginia Legisla
ture, and from 1838 to 1844 was President of Hamp-
den-Sidney College. His poems, a volume of which
appeared in 1810, have daintiness, but little depth —
characteristics of a great portion of Southern poetry.
To A FAIR LADY.
Fairest, mourn not for thy charms,
Circled by no lover's arms,
While inferior belles you see
Pick up husbands merrily.
5 Sparrows, when they choose to pair,
Meet their matches anywhere ;
But the Phcenix,* sadly great,
Cannot find an equal mate.
Earth, tho' dark, enjoys the honor
10 Of a Moon to wait upon her;
Venus,* tho' divinely bright,
Cannot boast a satellite.
To ANNE.
How many kisses do I ask?
Now you set me to my task.
15 First, sweet Anne, will you tell me
How many waves are in the sea?
How many stars are in the sky?
How many lovers you make sigh?
How many sands are on the shore ?
20 I shall want just one kiss more.
44 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
RICHARD DABNEY.
(1787-1825.)
There was something of real genius in Richard
Dabney. He had a genuinely poetic temperament.
Born of a family very important in the intellectual
development of Virginia, he himself became a teacher.
In the burning of a Richmond theater he was so badly
injured that the brilliant prospects of his life were
practically ruined, and he became a slave to opium
and liquor, and spent his last days rather equally be
tween his schoolhouse and the tavern. His Poems
Original and Translated appeared in 1812, and a larger
edition was printed in 1815. His imitations of Eurip
ides, Sappho, Seneca, Petrarch, and other classical
writers are smooth and well expressed.
AN EPIGRAM* IMITATED FROM ARCHIAS.*
O wise was the people that deeply lamented^
The hour that presented their children to light,
And gathering around, all the miseries recounted,
That brood o'er life's prospects and whelm them
in night.
5 And wise was the people that deeply delighted,
When death snatched its victim from life's cheer
less day;
For then, all the clouds, life's views that benighted,
They believed, at his touch, vanished quickly
away.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 45
Life, faithless and treacherous, is forever presenting
10 To our view flying phantoms we never can gain ;
Life, cruel and tasteless, is forever preventing
All our joys, and involving our pleasures in pain.
Death, kind and consoling, comes calmly and
lightly,
The balm of all sorrow, the cure of all ill ;
15 And after a pang, that but thrills o'er us slightly,
All then becomes tranquil, all then becomes still.
YOUTH AND AGE.
As numerous as the stars of heaven
Are the fond hopes to mortals given ;
But two illume, with brighter ray,
20 The morn and eve of life's short day.
Its glowing tints, on youth's fresh days,
The Lucifer* of life displays,
And bids its opening joys declare
Their bloom of prime shall be so fair,
25 That all its minutes, all its hours,
Shall breathe of pleasure's sweetest flowers.
But false the augury of that star —
The Lord of passion drives his car,
Swift up the middle line of heaven,
30 And blasts each flower that hope had given.
And care and woe, and pain and strife,
All mingle in the noon of life.
Its gentle beams, on man's last days,
The Hesperus* of life displays :
35 When all of passion's midday heat
Within the breast forgets to beat;
When calm and smooth our minutes glide,
46 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Along life's tranquillizing tide ;
It points with slow, receding light,
49 To the sweet rest of silent night ;
And tells, when life's vain schemes shall end,
Thus will its closing light descend,
And as the eve star seeks the wave,
Thus gently reach the quiet grave.
III.
THE PERIOD OF EXPANSION.
(1815-1850.)
GENERAL SURVEY.
In 1793 Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin —
doubtless the most momentous event in the earlier
history of the South. Strange as the fact may seem
to-day, cotton was unknown as a staple crop previous
to that date, and the raising of it inclined somewhat
toward our modern idea of "fancy gardening." But
with the coming of this invention the whole economic
and political system of the South was revolutionized.
Farmers from the coast rapidly moved westward, car
rying their slaves with them, and there sprang into
existence a vast interior civilization. Virginia lost
something of her old-time prestige; creative energy
passed to no small extent into the lower South; and
political domination transferred itself largely to the
Cotton Belt. By 1815 we find such men in Congress
as Crawford and Troup, of Georgia, and Henry Clay,
of Kentucky. The South no longer consisted merely
of Virginia and the Carolinas. Literature goes hand
in hand with History. We now find the interior con
tributing to poetry; while not a few new characteris
tics and not a little new energy present themselves.
4 (49)
RICHARD HENRY WILDE.
(1789-1847.)
Richard Henry Wilde was born at Dublin, Ireland,
and came to America when he was eight years of age.
After a boyhood of heavy toil and hardship, he became
a lawyer, served as Attorney-General of Georgia, was
a member of the House of Representatives of that
State, and at the age of twenty-five was chosen Con
gressman. Failing of reelection in 1834, he went to
Italy, became intensely interested in Italian literature,
found and rescued the only reliable portrait of Dante,
and wrote his large work, Conjectures and Researches
Concerning the Love, Madness, and Imprisonment of
Tasso. This and his poems are his most widely known
writings.
STANZAS.
My life is like the summer rose,
That opens to the morning sky,
But, ere the shades of evening close,
Is scattered on the ground — to die!
5 Yet on the rose's humble bed
The sweetest dews of night are shed,
As if she wept the waste to see —
But none shall weep a tear for me !*
My life is like the autumn leaf
10 That trembles in the moon's pale ray :
Its hold is frail — its date is brief,
Restless — and soon to pass away!
(50)
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 51
Yet, ere that leaf shall fall and fade,
The parent tree will mourn its shade,
15 The winds bewail the leafless tree —
But none shall breathe a sigh for me !
My life is like the prints which feet
Have left on Tampa's desert strand ;
Soon as the rising tide shall beat,
20 All trace will vanish from the sand ;
Yet, as if grieving to efface
All vestige of the human race,
On that lone shore loud moans the sea —
But none, alas ! shall mourn for me !
To THE MOCKING BIRD.
25 Winged mimic of the woods ! thou motley fool !
Who shall thy gay buffoonery describe?
Thine ever-ready notes of ridicule
Pursue thy fellows still with jest and gibe.
Wit, sophist, songster, Yorick* of thy tribe,
80 Thou sportive satirist of Nature's school,
To thee the palm of scoffing we ascribe.
Arch-mocker and mad Abbot of Misrule !*
For such thou art by day — but all night long
Thou pourest a soft, sweet, pensive, solemn strain,
35 As if thou didst in this thy moonlight song
Like to the melancholy Jacques* complain.
Musing on falsehood, folly, vice, and wrong,
And sighing for thy motley coat again.
A FAREWELL TO AMERICA.*
Farewell, my more than fatherland !*
Home of my heart and friends, adieu !
Lingering beside some foreign strand,
52 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
How oft shall I remember you !
How often, o'er the waters blue,
Send back a sigh to those I leave,
45 The loving and beloved few,
Who grieve for me — for whom I grieve !
We part ! — no matter how we part,
There are some thoughts we utter not,
Deep treasured in our inmost heart,
50 Never revealed, and ne'er forgot !
Why murmur at the common lot?
We part ! — I speak not of the pain —
But when shall I each lovely spot
And each loved face behold again?
55 It must be months, it may be years,*
It may — but no ! — I will not fill
Fond hearts with gloom, fond eyes with tears,
"Curious to shape uncertain ill."
Though humble — few and far — yet, still
60 Those hearts and eyes are ever dear ;
Theirs is the love no time can chill,
The truth no chance or change can sear !
All I have seen, and all I see,
Only endears them more and more ;
65 Friends cool, hopes fade, and hours flee,
Affection lives when all is o'er !
Farewell, my more than native shore !
I do not seek or hope to find,
Roam where I will, what I deplore
70 To leave with them and thee behind !
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 53
MIRABEAU BONAPARTE LAMAR.
(1798-1859.)
Born and reared at Louisville, Georgia, Mirabeau
Lamar was for some years engaged in business in
that town. In 1835 he removed to Te,xas, served in
the Mexican War, became attorney-general, secretary
of war, vice president, and president of the Republic
of Texas, and was appointed United States minister to
Argentine Republic in 1857 and minister to Nicaragua
and Costa Rica in 1858. In a literary way he should
be remembered for a few lyrics, especially those deal
ing with fair women.
THE DAUGHTER OF MENDOZA.*
O lend to me, sweet nightingale,
Your music by the fountains !
And lend to me your cadences,
O river of the mountains !
5 That I may sing my gay brunette,
A diamond spark in coral set,
Gem for a prince's coronet —
The daughter of Mendoza.
How brilliant is the morning star!
10 The evening star how tender !
The light of both is in her eye,
Their softness and their splendor.
But for the lash that shades their light,
They are too dazzling for the sight;
15 And when she shuts them, all is night —
The daughter of Mendoza.
54 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
O! ever bright and beauteous one,
Bewildering and beguiling,
The lute is in thy silvery tones,
20 The rainbow in thy smiling.
And thine is, too, o'er hill and dell,
The bounding of the young gazelle.
The arrow's flight and ocean's swell —
Sweet daughter of Mendoza !
25 What though, perchance, we meet no more?
What though too soon we sever ?
Thy form will float like emerald light
Before my vision ever.
For who can see and then forget
30 The glories of my gay brunette?
Thou art too bright a star to set —
Sweet daughter of Mendoza !
EDWARD COATE PINKNEY.
(1802-1828.)
A brief, unhappy life was that of Pinkney. Born
in London, where his father was stationed as minister
to the Court of St. James, he spent the first eight
years of his life in England, then came to America
and entered St. Mary's College, Baltimore, became a
midshipman in the United States navy, began the
study of law in 1822, was admitted to the bar in 1824,
and became professor of belles-lettres in the Univer
sity of Maryland in 1826. He was then considered
one of the "five greatest poets of the country;" but,
as poets of rank were somewhat scarce at that time,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 55
this was not necessarily a compliment. However, he
did possess something of the fervor and finish of true
genius. His one volume, Poems, appeared in 1825.
A HEALTH.*
I fill this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,
A woman of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon;
5 To whom the better elements
And kindly stars have given
A form so fair that, like the air,
'Tis less of earth than heaven.
Her every tone is music's own,
10 Like those of morning birds,
And something more than melody
Dwells ever in her words ;
The coinage of her heart are they,
And from her lips each flows
15 As one may see the burdened bee
Forth issue from the rose.
Affections are as thoughts to her,
The measures of her hours;
Her feelings have the fragrancy,
20 The freshness of young flowers ;
And lovely passions, changing oft,
So fill her she appears
The image of themselves by turns —
The idol of past years !
25 Of her bright face one glance will trace
A picture on the brain,
And of her voice in echoing hearts
A sound must long remain;
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
But memory, such as mine of her,
30 So very much endears.
When death is nigh my latest sigh
Will not be life's, but hers.
I fill this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,
35 A woman of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon —
Her health ! and would on earth there stood
Some more of such a frame,
That life might be all poetry.
40 And weariness a name.
VOTIVE SONG.
I burn no incense, hang no wreath,
On this thine early tomb!
Such cannot cheer the place of death,
But only mock its gloom.
45 Here odorous smoke and breathing flower
No grateful influence shed ;
They lose their perfume and their power,
When offered to the dead.
And if, as is the Afghaun's* creed,
B0 The spirit may return,
A disembodied sense, to feed
On fragrance near its urn —
It is enough that she, whom thou
Didst love in living years,
65 Sits desolate beside it now,
And fall these heavy tears.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 57
A SERENADE.*
Look out upon the stars, my love,
nd shame them with thine eyes,.}
On which, than on the lights above,
60 There hang more destinies.
Night's beauty is the harmony
Of blending shades and light!
Then, lady, up — look out, and be
A sister to the night!
65 Sleep not! thine image wakes for aye
Within my watching breast :
Sleep not! from her soft sleep should fly
Who robs all hearts of rest.
Nay, lady, from thy slumbers break,
70 And make this darkness gay.
With looks whose brightness well might make
Of darker nights a day.
GEORGE DEN ISO N PRENTICE,
(1802-1870.)
George D. Prentice was born at Boston, Massachu
setts, was educated at Brown University, and came
to the South in 1830. He founded the Louisville
Journal (afterwards the Courier- Journal) and be
came a leader in Southern political and literary affairs.
His witty Prentidana and his sympathetic Life of Hen
ry Clay were once very popular books, and still have
readers ; but his poems, which are a little too declama-
5« THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
tory to suit modern taste, are not widely known to
day. They were not collected until six years after his
death.
LINES TO A LADY.1
Lady, I've gazed on thee,
And thou art now a vision of the Past,
A spirit star, whose holy light is cast
On memory's voiceless sea.
That star — it lingers there
As beautiful as 'twere a dewy flower,
Soft wafted down from Eden's glorious bower,
And floating in mid-air.
It is that blessed one
1 The day star of my destiny— the first
I e'er could worship as the Persian erst
Worshiped his own loved sun.*
On all my years may lie
The shadow of the tempest, their dark flow
5 Be wild and drear, but that dear one will glow
Still beautiful on high.
THE CLOSING YEAR.*
'Tis midnight's holy hour— and silence now
Is brooding, like a gentle spirit, o'er
The still and pulseless world. Hark ! on the winds
1 The bell's deep notes are swelling. 'Tis the knell
Of the departed year.
No funeral train
'These selections are used with the permission of the pub
lishers, Robert Clarke Company, Cincinnati.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 59
Is sweeping past: yet on the stream and wood,
With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest,
25 Like a pale, spotless shroud ; the air is stirred,
As by a mourner's sigh ; and on yon cloud,
That floats so still and placidly through heaven,
The spirits of the seasons seem to stand-
Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn
form,
30 And Winter, with his aged locks — and breathe
In mournful cadences, that come abroad
Like the far wind harp's wild and touching wail,
A melancholy dirge o'er the dead Year,
Gone from the earth forever.
35 Tis a time
For memory and for tears. Within the deep,
Still chambers of the heart a specter dim,
Whose tones are like the wizard voice of Time,
Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold
40 And solemn finger to the beautiful
And holy visions that have passed away
And left no shadow of their loveliness
On the dead waste of life. That specter lifts
The coffin lid of hope, and joy, and love,
45 And, bending mournfully above the pale,
Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead flow
ers
O'er what has passed to nothingness.
The year
Has gone, and, with it, many a glorious throng
50 Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow,
Its shadow on each heart. In its swift course
It waved its scepter o'er the beautiful,
And they are not. It laid its pallid hand
Upon the strong man, and the haughty form
55 Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim.
It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged
60 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
The bright and joyous, and the tearful wail
Of stricken ones is heard, where erst the song
And reckless shout resounded. It passed o'er
60 The battle plain, where sword, and spear, and
shield
Flashed in the light of midday — and the strength
Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass.
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above
The crushed and moldering skeleton. It came
6r> And faded like a wreath of mist at eve ;
Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air,
It heralded its millions to their home
In the dim land of dreams.
Remorseless Time ! —
Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe !* what power
70 Can stay him in his silent course, or melt
His iron heart to pity? On, still on
He presses and forever. The proud bird.
The condor of the Andes, that can soar
Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave
75 The fury of the Northern hurricane
And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,
Furls his broad wings at nightfall and sinks down
To rest upon his mountain crag, — but Time
Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness,
0 And night's deep darkness has no chain to bind
His rushing pinion. Revolutions sweep
O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast
Of dreaming sorrow ; cities rise and sink,
Like bubbles on the water ; fiery isles
85 Spring, blazing, from the ocean, and go back
To their mysterious caverns ; mountains rear
To heaven their bald and blackened cliffs, and bow
Their tall heads to the plain ; new empires rise,
Gathering the strength of hoary centuries,
00 And rush down like the Alpine avalanche,
Startling the nations; and the very stars,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 6 1
Yon bright and burning blazonry of God,
Glitter a while in their eternal depths,
And, like the Pleiad,* loveliest of their train,
95 Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away,
To darkle in the trackless void ; yet Time,
Time, the tomb builder, holds his fierce career,
Dark, stern, all pitiless, and pauses not.
Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path,
100 To sit and muse, like other conquerors,
Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought.
WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS.
(1806-1870.)
In William Gilmore Simms we find one of the most
versatile of Americans. He was a lawyer, a planter, a
statesman, an editor, a novelist, a dramatist, a critic, a
biographer, an historian, and a poet. He was born at
Charleston, South Carolina, was early left an orphan,
and, through unceasing endeavors, fought his way to
success. A most prolific writer himself, he became
a most enthusiastic patron of literature, and gathered
around himself some of the most brilliant men of his
day. No attempt could be made here to give a com
plete list of his works. Ten years before his death
they numbered eighteen volumes of poetry and more
than sixty volumes of history, criticism, and fiction.
Perhaps he is known best to-day by two of his novels,
The Yemassee (1835) and The Partisan (1835); but
there are qualities in his poems that are worthy of
modern-day attention and admiration.
62 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
THE GRAPEVINE SWING.*
Lithe and long as the serpent train,
Springing and clinging from tree to tree,
Now darting- upward, now down again,
With a twist and a twirl that are strange to see
5 Never took serpent a deadlier hold,
Never the cougar a wilder spring,
Strangling the oak with the boa's fold,
Spanning the beech with the condor's wing.
Yet no foe that we fear to seek —
10 The boy leaps wild to thy rude embrace ;
Thy bulging arms bear as soft a cheek
As ever on lover's breast found place :
On thy waving train is a playful hold
Thou shalt never to lighter grasp persuade ;
15 While a maiden sits in thy drooping fold,
And swings and sings in the noonday shade !
O ! giant strange of our Southern woods,
I dream of thee still in the well-known spot,
Though our vessel strain o'er the ocean floods,
20 And the Northern forest beholds thee not ;
I think of thee still with a sweet regret,
As the cordage yields to my playful grasp —
Dost thou spring and cling in our woodlands yet?
Does the maiden still swing in thy giant clasp ?
THE LOST PLEIAD.
25 Not in the sky,
Where it was seen
So long in eminence of light serene —
Nor on the white tops of the glistering wave,
Nor down, in mansions of the hidden deep,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 63
30 Though beautiful in green
And crystal, its great caves of mystery
Shall the bright watcher have
Her place and, as of old, high station keep !
Gone ! gone !
35 Oh ! nevermore, to cheer
The mariner, who holds his course alone
On the Atlantic, through the weary night,
When the stars turn to watchers, and do sleep,
Shall it again appear,
40 With the sweet-loving certainty of light,
Down shining on the shut eyes of the deep !
The upward-looking shepherd on the hills
Of Chaldea,* night returning, with his flocks,
He wonders why his beauty doth not blaze,
45 Gladding his gaze, —
And, from his dreary watch along the rocks,
Guiding him homeward o'er the perilous ways !
How stands he waiting still, in a sad maze,
Much wondering, while the drowsy silence fills
50 The sorrowful vault ! — how lingers, in the hope that
night
May yet renew the expected and sweet light,
So natural to his sight !
And lone.
Where, at the first, in smiling love she shone,
55 Brood the once happy circle of bright stars :
How should they dream, until her fate was known,
That they were ever confiscate to death?
That dark oblivion the pure beauty mars,
And, like the earth, its common bloom and breath,
' That they should fall from high;
The lights grow blasted by a touch, and die, —
All their concerted springs of harmony
Snapped rudely, and the generous music gone !
64 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Ah ! still the strain
65 Of wailing sweetness fills the saddening sky ;
The sister stars, . lamenting in their pain
That one of the selectest ones must die —
Must vanish, when most lovely, from the rest !
Alas ! 'tis ever thus the destiny.
70 Even Rapture's song hath evermore a tone
Of wailing, as for bliss too quickly gone.
The hope most precious is the soonest lost,
The flower most sweet is first to feel the frost.
Are not all short-lived things the loveliest?
75 And, like the pale star, shooting down the sky,
Look they not ever brightest, as they fly
From the lone sphere they blest?
SONG IN MARCH.
Now are the winds about us in their glee,
Tossing the slender tree ;
80 Whirling the sands about his furious car,
March cometh from afar ;
Breaks the sealed magic of old Winter s dreams,
And rends his glossy streams;
Chafing with potent airs, he fiercely takes
85 Their fetters from the lakes,
And, with a power by queenly Spring supplied,
Wakens the slumbering tide.
With a wild love he seeks young Summer's charms
And clasps her to his arms ;
90 Lifting his shield between, he drives away
Old Winter from his prey;
The ancient tyrant, whom he boldly braves,
Goes howling to his caves ;
And, to his northern realm compelled 1 tty,
95 Yields up the victory ;
Melted are all his bands, overthrown his towers,
And March comes bringing flowers.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 65
EDGAR ALLAN POE.
(1809-1849.)
In all literary history there is scarcely a record of
a life more filled with trials, discouragement, and sor
row than that of Edgar Allan Poe. His grandfather,
General David Poe, was a famous Revolutionary hero ;
his father had deserted the practice of law to join a
company of players at Charleston, South Carolina;
and his mother was a beautiful actress who was a
member of this troupe. He was born while the com
pany was playing in Boston. Two years later his
father was lying dead in Richmond, Virginia, and the
mother soon followed. Edgar was adopted t^y John
Allan, a very wealthy merchant of that city, and by
much petting and indulgence in amusing but doubt
ful customs, such as drinking repeatedly to company's
health, was given a most promising start toward fu
ture troubles and final ruin. At the age of six he was
taken to England and attended school there for five
years.
In 1826 he entered the University of Virginia, im
mediately gained notice in the study of languages,
began to drink and gamble, contracted heavy debts,
was taken from the institution, entered a counting-
house of Mr. Allan's, ran away, and went to Boston.
There he published a volume of verse (1827) and,
under an assumed name, entered the regular army.
In 1829 Mr. Allan had him entered at West Point;
but, through willful neglect of duty, he was discharged
5
66 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
in 1831. Another volume of verse appeared soon aft
erwards. In 1833 he won a prize of one hundred dol
lars offered by The Baltimore Saturday Visitor for
the best short story — his Manuscript Found in a Bot
tle. He secured a place on the Southern Literary
Messenger of Baltimore, in 1835, was made editor,
married his cousin, Virginia Clemm, during the next
year, and soon lost his position on the Messenger,
possibly through drinking and neglect of duty. One
year in New York, six in Philadelphia, back to New
York, South again, and then death in a dreadful form
— such is the closing history of his career.
In Philadelphia he became editor of The Gentle
man's Magazine and later of Graham's Magazine. It
was at this time that he was writing some of his great
est stories and such poetry as The Raven (1844). In
1845 he gained both business and editorial control of
The Broadway Journal, New York; but this soon
failed. His beloved wife, who had ever been an in
spiration and help to him, died amidst heartrending
poverty, in 1847. Poe, now a mere wreck, wandered
back to Baltimore, and is said to have been drugged,
taken to the polls to be voted, and then left half dead
upon the streets. He died Sunday, October 7, 1849.
"He was great in his genius, unhappy in his life,
wretched in his death; but in his fame he is immor
tal."
In technical and artistic phases Poe's poetry is
scarcely equaled by that of any other American poet.
His theory of verse was that words were instruments
or means for producing music, and sometimes he made
meaning subordinate to sound. He taught no philoso-
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 67
phy and was neither moral nor immoral; he was sim
ply unmoral. But in the higher harmony of beauti
fully mingling words he was a master. He believed
that a song was worth while simply as a song. Swin
burne has said of our country : "Once as yet, and once
only, has there sounded out of it all one pure note of
original song worth singing and echoed from the sing
ing of no other man ; a note of song neither wide nor
deep, but utterly true, rich, clear, and native to the
singer ; the short exquisite music, subtle and simple
and somber and sweet, of Edgar Poe."
ISRAFEL.
"And the angel Israfcl, whose heartstrings are a lute, and
who has the sweetest voice of all God's creatures." — Koran.
In Heaven a spirit doth dwell
Whose heartstrings are a lute;
None sing so wildly well
As the angel Israfel,
5 And the giddy* stars (so legends tell),
Ceasing their hymns, attend the spell
Of his voice, all mute.
Tottering above
In her highest noon,
10 The enamored moon
Blushes with love,
While, to listen, the red levin*
(With the rapid Pleiads, even,
Which were seven)
15 Pauses in Heaven.
And they say (the starry choir
And the other listening things)
68 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
That Israfeli's fire
Is owing to that lyre
20 By which he sits and sings, —
The trembling living wire
Of those unusual strings.
But the skies that angel trod,
Where deep thoughts are a duty,
25 Where Love's a grown-up God,
Where the Houri* glances are
Imbued with all the beauty
Which we worship in a star.
Therefore thou art not wrong,
80 Israfeli, who despisest
An unimpassioned song;
To thee the laurels belong,
Best bard, because the wisest:
Merrily live, and long!
35 The ecstasies above
With thy burning measures suit :
Thy grief, thy joy, thy hate, thy love,
With the fervor of thy lute ;
Well may the stars be mute !
40 Yes, Heaven is thine ; but this
Is a world of sweets and sours;
Our flowers are merely — flowers,
And the shadow of thy perfect bliss
Is the sunshine of ours.
45 If I could dwell
Where Israfel
Hath dwelt, and he where I,
He might not sing so wildly well
A mortal melody,
50 While a bolder note than this might swell
From my lyre within the sky.*
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 69
THE BELLS.*
Hear the sledges with the bells,
Silver bells !
What a world of merriment their melody foretells !
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night !
While the stars, that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,*
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.
Hear the mellow wedding bells,
Golden bells !
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells !
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight !
From the molten-golden notes,
And all in tune.
What a liquid ditty floats
To the turtle dove that listens, while she gloats
On the moon !
O, from out the sounding cells,
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells !
How it swells!
How it dwells
On the Future ! How it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells,
70 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Of the bells,, bells, bells, bells,
85 Bells, bells, bells—
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells !
Hear the loud alarum bells,
Brazen bells !
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
90 In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
95 In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic
fire.
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor
100 NOW — now to sit, or never,
By the side of the palefaced moon.
O, the bells, bells, bells !
What a tale their terror tells
Of Despair!
105 How they clang, and clash, and roar !
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air !
Yet the ear it fully knows
By the twanging
110 And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and flows ;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling
And the wrangling,
115 How the danger sinks and swells, —
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the
bells,
Of the bells,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 71
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
120 In the clamor and the clangor of the bells !
Hear the tolling of the bells,
Iron bells !
What a world of solemn thought their monody
compels !
In the silence of the night
125 How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone !
For every sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
130 And the people — ah, the people,
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,
And who tolling, tolling, tolling,
In that muffled monotone,
135 Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone —
They are neither man nor woman,
They are neither brute nor human.
They are Ghouls!
140 And their king it is who tolls ;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,
Rolls
A psean from the bells;
And his merry bosom swells
145 With the pa^an of the bells,
And he dances, and he yells :
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the psean of the bells,
150 Of the bells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
72 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
To the throbbing of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells—
To the sobbing of the bells ;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy Runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells:
To the tolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.
ANNABEL LEE.*
165 It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee ;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
170 Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea ;
But we loved with a love that was more than love,
I and my Annabel Lee;
175 With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
180 My beautiful Annabel Lee ;
So that her highborn kinsmen came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulcher
In this kingdom by the sea.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 7$
185 The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me;
Yes ! that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
190 Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we,
Of many far wiser than we ;
And neither the angels in heaven above,
195 Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:
For the moon never beams, without bringing me
dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
200 And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down* by the side
Of my darling — my darling — my life and my bride,
In her sepulcher there by the sea,
205 In her tomb by the sounding sea.
THE RAVEN.*
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered,
weak and weary.
Over many a quaint and curious volume of for
gotten lore, —
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there
came a tapping.
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my
chamber door.
74 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
210 "Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my
chamber door :
Only this and nothing more."
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak De
cember,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost
upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow ; — vainly I had sought
to borrow
215 From my books surcease of sorrow — sorrow for the
lost Lenore,
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels
name Lenore :
Nameless here for evermore.
And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each
purple curtain
Thrilled me — filled me with fantastic terrors never
felt before;
220 So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood
repeating:
" 'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my cham
ber door.
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber
door :
This it is and nothing more."
Presently my soul grew stronger ; hesitating then
no longer,
225 "Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly your forgiveness I
implore ;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you
came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my
chamber door,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 75
That I scarce was sure I heard you" — here I opened
wide the door : —
Darkness there and nothing more.
230 Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there
wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared
to dream before ;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave
no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered
word, "Lenore?"
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the
word, "Lenore :"
235 Merely this and nothing more.
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within
me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than
before.
"Surely/' said I, "surely that is something at my
window lattice ;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery
explore ;
240 Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery ex
plore :
'Tis the wind and nothing more."
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a
flirt and flutter,*
In there stepped a stately Raven* of the saintly
days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute
stopped or stayed he;
245 But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my
chamber door,
76 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Perched upon a bust of Pallas* just above my cham
ber door :
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into
smiling
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance
it wore, —
230 "Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I
said, "art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from
the Nightly shore:
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plu
tonian* shore:"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
Much I marveled this ungainly fowl to hear dis
course so plainly,
255 Though his answer little meaning — little relevancy
bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human
being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his
chamber door,
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his
chamber door,
With such name as "Nevermore."
260 But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust,
spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he
did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered, not a feather then
he fluttered,
Till I scarcely more than muttered, "Other friends
have flown before:
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 77
On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have
flown before."
265 Then the bird said, "Nevermore."
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly
spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock
and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerci
ful Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one
burden bore:
270 Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden
bore
Of 'Never — nevermore.' "
But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into
smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird
and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to
linking
275 Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird
of yore,
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and omi
nous bird of yore
Meant in croaking "Nevermore."
Thus I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable ex
pressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my
bosom's core;
280 This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease
reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight
gloated o'er,
7 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamplight
gloating o'er
She shall press., ah, nevermore !
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed
from an unseen censer
285 Swung by seraphim whose footfalls tinkled on the
tufted floor.
"Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee— by
these angels he hath sent thee
Respite — respite and nepenthe* from thy memories
of Lenore;
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this
lost Lenore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
-90"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! prophet still, if
bird or devil !
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed
thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land en
chanted —
On this home by Horror haunted — tell me truly, I
implore :
Is there— is there balm in Gilead ?*— tell me— tell
me, I implore!"
205 Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Prophet !" said I, "thing of evil ! prophet still, if
bird or devil !
By that Heaven that bends above us, by that God
we both adore,
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the dis
tant Aidenn,*
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels
name Lenore :
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 79
300 Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels
name Lenore !"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!"
I shrieked, upstarting:
"Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's
Plutonian shore !
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul
hath spoken !
305 Leave my loneliness unbroken! quit the bust above
my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy
form from off my door !"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is
sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber
door;
310 And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that
is dreaming,
And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his
shadow on the floor :
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating
on the floor
Shall be lifted — nevermore !
To ONE IN PARADISE.*
Thou wast that all to me, love,
For which my soul did pine —
A green isle in the sea, love,
A fountain and a shrine,
All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers,
And all the flowers were mine.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
820 Ah, dream, too bright to last!
Ah, starry Hope, that didst arise
But to be overcast !
A voice from out the Future cries,
"On ! on !"— but o'er the Past
825 (Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies
Mute, motionless, aghast !
For, alas ! alas ! with me
The light of Life is o'er !
No more — no more — no more —
330 ( Such language holds the solemn sea
To the sands upon the shore)
Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree
Or the stricken eagle soar !
And all my days are trances,
335 And all my nightly dreams
Are where thy dark eye glances,
And where thy footstep gleams —
In what ethereal dances,
Bv what eternal streams.
THE CONQUEROR WORM.*
340 Lo! 'tis a gala night
Within the lonesome latter years.
An angel throng, bewinged, bedight
In veils, and drowned in tears,
Sit in a theater* to see
345 A play* of hopes and fears,
While the orchestra breathes fitfully
The music of the spheres.
Mimes,* in the form of God on high,
Mutter and mumble low,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 8 1
350 And hither and thither fly;
Mere puppets they, who come and go
At bidding of vast formless things
That shift the scenery to and fro,
Flapping from out their condor wings
355 Invisible woe.
That motley drama — oh, be sure
It shall not be forgot!
With its Phantom* chased for evermore
By a crowd that seize it not,
360 Through a circle that ever returneth in
To the selfsame spot ;
And much of Madness, and more of Sin,
And Horror the soul of the plot.
But see amid the mimic rout
365 A crawling shape intrude:
A blood-red thing that writhes from out
The scenic solitude!
It writhes — it writhes ! — with mortal pangs
The mimes become its food,
370 And seraphs sob at vermin fangs
In human gore imbued.
Out — out are the lights — out all !
And over each quivering form
The curtain, a funeral pall,
Comes down with the rush of a storm,
While ^the angels, all pallid and wan,
Uprising, unveiling, affirm
That the play is the tragedy, "Man,"
And its hero, the Conqueror Worm.
6
82 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
ALBERT PIKE.
(1809-1891.)
Albert Pike was born at Boston, attended Harvard
for a short time, taught school in New England, and
in 1831 made an extensive tour of the West. In 1833
he settled at Fort Smith, Arkansas, and there taught
school, edited the Arkansas Advocate, and studied law.
He served through the war with Mexico, and was a
brigadier general in charge of Indian troops in the
Confederate army. In 1866 he removed to Memphis,
Tennessee, and there edited the Appeal, and in 1868
took up the practice of law at Washington, D. C. Be
sides writing many works on Freemasonry, he was the
author of four volumes of verse, the most famous,
perhaps, being his Hymns to the Gods, contributed to
Blackwood's Magazine.
To THE MOCKING BIRD.
Thou glorious mocker of the world ! I hear
Thy many voices ringing through the glooms
Of these green solitudes ; and all the clear.
Bright joyance of their song enthralls the ear,
5 And floods the heart. Over the sphered tombs.
Of vanished nations rolls thy music tide;
No light from History's starlit page illumes
The memory of these nations; they have died:
None care for them but thou; and thou mayst
sing
O'er me, perhaps, as now thy clear notes ring
Over their bones by whom thou once wast deified.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 83
Glad scorner of all cities !* Thou dost leave
The world's mad turmoil and incessant din,
Where none in other's honesty believe,
15 Where the old sigh, the young turn gray and grieve,
Where misery gnaws the maiden's heart within:
Thou fleest far into the dark green woods,
Where, with thy flood of music, thou canst win
Their heart to harmony, and where intrudes
No discord on thy melodies. O, where,
Among the sweet musicians of the air,
Is one so dear as thou to these old solitudes?
Ha ! what a burst was that ! The yEolian* strain
Goes floating through the tangled passages
25 Of the still woods, and now it comes again,
A multitudinous melody, — like a rain
Of glassy music under echoing trees,
Close by a ringing lake. It wraps the soul
With a bright harmony of happiness,
30 Even as a gem is wrapped when round it roll
Thin waves of crimson flame ; till we become,
With the excess of perfect pleasure, dumb.
And pant like a swift runner clinging to the goal.
I cannot love* the man who doth not love,
35 As men love light, the song of happy birds ;
For the first visions that my boy heart wove
To fill its sleep with, were that I did rove
Through the fresh woods, what time the snowy
herds
Of morning clouds shrunk from the advancing sun
40 Into the depths of Heaven's blue heart, as words
From the Poet's lips float gently, one by one,
And vanish in the human heart ; and then
I reveled in such songs, and sorrowed when,
With noon-heat overwrought, the music-gush was
done.
84 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
45 I would, sweet bird, that I might live with thee,
Amid the eloquent grandeur of these shades,
Alone with nature— but it may not be ;
I have to struggle with the stormy sea
Of human life until existence fades
50 Into death's darkness. Thou wilt sing and soar
Through the thick woods and shadow-checkered
glades,
While pain and sorrow cast no dimness o'er
The brilliance of thy heart ; but I must wear,
As now, my garments of regret and care,
55 As penitents of old their galling sackcloth wore.
Yet why complain? What though fond hopes de
ferred
Have overshadowed Life's green paths with
gloom?
Content's soft music is not all unheard ;
There is a voice sweeter than thine, sweet bird,
60 To welcome me within my humble home ;
There is an eye, with love's devotion bright,
The darkness of existence to illume.
Then why complain? When Death shall cast his
blight
Over the spirit, my cold bones shall rest
65 Beneath these trees ; and from thy swelling breast,
Over them pour thy song, like a rich flood of light.
To SPRING.
O thou delicious Spring!
Nursed in the lap of thin and subtle showers,
Which fall from clouds that lift their snowy wing
70 From odorous beds of light-enfolded flowers,
And from enmassed bowers,
That over grassy walks their greenness fling,
Come, gentle Spring!
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 85
Thou lover of young wind,
75 That cometh from the invisible upper sea
Beneath the sky, which clouds, its white foam,
bind,
And, settling in the trees deliciously,
Makes young leaves dance with glee,
Even in the teeth of that old, sober hind,
Winter unkind.
Come to us; for thoti art
Like the fine love of children, gentle Spring!
Touching the sacred feeling of the heart,
Or like a virgin's pleasant welcoming ;
And thou dost ever bring
A tide of gentle but resistless "art
Upon the heart.
Red Autumn* from the South
Contends with thee ; alas ! what may he show ?
What are his purple-stained and rosy mouth,
And browned cheeks, to thy soft feet of snow,
And timid, pleasant glow,
Giving earth-piercing flowers their primal growth,
And greenest youth ?
95
Gay Summer conquers thee ;
And yet he has no beauty such as thine ;
What is his ever-streaming, fiery sea,
To the pure glory that with thee doth shine ?
Thou season most divine,
What may his dull and lifeless minstrelsy
Compare with thee?
Come, sit upon the hills,
And bid the waking streams leap down their side.
And green the vales with their slight sounding
rills:
86 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
105 And when the stars upon the sky shall glide.
And crescent Dian* ride,
I too will breathe of thy delicious thrills,
On grassy hills.
Alas ! bright Spring, not long
110 Shall I enjoy thy pleasant influence;
For thou shalt die the summer heat among,
% Sublimed to vapour in his fire intense,
And, gone forever hence,
Exist no more : no more to earth belong,
115 Except in song.
So I who sing shall die :
Worn unto death, perchance, by care and sorrow ;
And, fainting thus with an unconscious sigh.
Bid unto this poor body a good-morrow,
120 Which now sometimes I borrow,
And breathe of joyance keener and more high,
Ceasing to sigh !
EVERY YEAR.
Life is a count of losses,
Every year;
125 For the weak are heavier crosses,
Every year ;
Lost Springs with sobs replying
Unto weary Autumns' sighing,
While those we love are dying,
130 Every year.
The days have less of gladness,
Every year ;
The nights more weight of sadness,
Every year ;
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 87
135 Fair Springs no longer charm us,
The winds and weather harm us,
The threats of Death alarm us,
Every year.
There come new cares and sorrows,
140 Every year;
Dark days and darker morrows,
Every year ;
The ghosts of dead loves haunt us,
The ghosts of changed friends taunt us,
145 And disappointments daunt us,
Every vear.
To the Past go more dead faces.
Every year ;
As the loved leave vacant places,
i5o Every year;
Everywhere the sad eyes meet us,
In the evening's dusk they greet us,
And to come to them entreat us,
Every year.
155 "You are growing old," they tell us,
''Every year."
"You are more alone," they tell us,
"Every year;
You can win no new affection,
IGO YOU have only recollection,
Deeper sorrow and dejection,
Every year."
Too true ! — Life's shores are shifting,
Every year;
165 And we are seaward drifting,
Every year ;
88 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Old places, changing, fret us,
The living more forget us,
There are fewer to regret us,
170 Every year.
But the truer life draws nigher,
Every year;
And its Morning Star climbs higher,
Every year;
175 Earth's hold on us grows slighter,
And the heavy burthen lighter,
And the Dawn Immortal brighter.
Every year.
ALEXANDER BEAUFORT MEEK.
(1814-1865.)
Alexander Meek was born at Columbia, South Caro
lina, but early removed to Tuscaloosa, Alabama. He
was educated at the University of Alabama and at the
University of Georgia, and became a lawyer in 1835.
He served as editor of various Southern papers, held
several political positions, and was in 1845 Assistant
Secretary of the Treasury. His verse appeared in two
volumes, Red Eagle (1855) and Songs and Poems of
the South (1857).
LAND OF THE SOUTH.
I.
Land of the South! — imperial land! —
How proud thy mountains rise!
How sweet thy scenes on every hand!
How fair thy covering skies!
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 89
5 But not for this — oh, not for these —
I love thy fields to roam;
Thou hast a dearer spell to me, —
Thou art my native home!
II.
The rivers roll their liquid wealth,
10 Unequaled to the sea;
Thy hills and valleys bloom with health,
And green with verdure be!
But not fpr thy proud ocean streams,
Not for thine azure dome,
15 Sweet, sunny South, I cling to thee, —
Thou art my native home!
III.
I've stood beneath Italia's clime,
Beloved of tale and song,
On Helvyn's* hills, proud and sublime,
20 Where nature's wonders throng;
By Tempe's* classic sunlit streams,
Where Gods, of old, did roam, —
But ne'er have found so fair a land
As thou, my native home !
IV.
25 And thou hast prouder glories, too,
Than nature ever gave;
Peace sheds o'er thee her genial dew,
And Freedom's pinions wave;
Fair Science flings her pearls around,
B0 Religion lifts her dome, —
These, these endear thee to my heart,
My own, loved native home !
9° THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
V.
And "Heaven's best gift to man"* is thine —
God bless thy rosy girls !
35 Like sylvan flowers they sweetly shine,
Their hearts are pure as pearls !
And grace and goodness circle them,
Where'er their footsteps roam;
How can I then, whilst loving them,
40 Not love mv native home ?
VI.
Land of the South! — imperial land! —
Then here's a health to thee :
Long as thy mountain barriers stand,
May'st thou be blest and free !
May dark dissension's banner ne'er
Wave o'er thy fertile loam !
But should it come, there's one will die
To save his native home !
THE MOCKING BIRD.
From the vale, what music ringing,
r>0 Fills the bosom of the night;
On the sense, entranced., flinging
Spells of witchery and delight!
O'er magnolia, lime, and cedar,
From yon locust top it swells,
e5 Like the chant of serenader,
Or the rhymes of silver bells !
Listen ! dearest, listen to it !
Sweeter sounds were never heard !
'Tis the song of that wild poet—
60 Mime and minstrel — Mocking Bird.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 9!
See him, swinging in his glory.
On yon topmost bending limb!
Caroling his amorous story,
Like some wild crusader's hymn !
65 Now it faints in tones delicious
As the first low vow of love !
Now it bursts in swells capricious,
All the moonlit vale above !
Listen ! dearest, etc.
70 Why is't thus, this sylvan Petrarch*
Pours all night his serenade?
Tis for some proud woodland Laura,
His sad sonnets all are made !
But he changes now his measure —
75 Gladness bubbling from his mouth —
Jest, and gibe, and mimic pleasure —
Winged Anacreon* of the South!
Listen ! dearest, etc.
Bird of music,* wit, and gladness,
80 Troubadour of sunny climes,
Disenchanter of all sadness,
Would thine art were in my rhymes !
O'er the heart that's beating by me
I would weave a spell divine;
85 Is there aught she could deny me
Drinking in such strains as thine?
Listen ! dearest, etc.
92 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN' POETRY.
PHILIP PENDLETON COOKE.
(1816-1850.)
Philip Pendleton Cooke was supposed to be a law
yer ; but his avocations — hunting and writing — left
little time for his vocation. Born at Martinsburg,
Virginia, he was educated at Princeton, studied law,
and opened an office — where he was seldom seen. His
verse appeared frequently in the Knickerbocker Maga
zine, The Gentleman's Magazine, and the Southern
Literary Messenger. His one collection, Froissart
Ballads and Other Poems, appeared in 1847, but does
not by any means contain all of his efforts. Rosa Lee
and To My Daughter Lily were among his most widely
known lines; but Florence Vane was by far the most
popular.
FLORENCE VANE.*
I loved thee long and dearly,
Florence Vane;
My life's bright dream and early
Hath come again;
5 I renew in my fond vision
My heart's dear pain,
My hope, and thy derision,
Florence Vane !
The ruin, lone and hoary,
10 The ruin old,
Where thou didst hark my story,
At even told. —
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 93
That spot — the hues Elysian*
Of sky and plain —
15 I treasure in my vision,
Florence Vane.
Thou wast lovelier than the roses
In their prime ;
Thy voice excelled the closes
20 Of sweetest rhyme;
Thy heart was as a river
Without a main.*
Would I had loved thee never,
Florence Vane !
25 But, fairest, coldest wonder '
Thy glorious clay
Lieth the green sod under —
Alas the day!
And it boots not to remember
30 Thy disdain-
To quicken love's pale ember,
Florence Vane!
The lilies of the valley
By young graves weep,
35 The daisies love to dally
Where maidens sleep:
May their bloom, in beauty vying,
Never wane
Where thine earthly part is lying,
40 Florence Vane !
94 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
SEVERN TEACKLE WALLIS.
(1816-1894.)
Severn Teackle Wallis was a man active in many
walks of life. Born at Baltimore, he was educated
at St. Mary's College in that city, and became known
as one of the most successful lawyers and reformers
in the South. In 1847 he visited Spain and wrote his
Glimpses of Spain, and two years later was appointed
by the United States to go back and examine the titles
of East Florida lands. He became Provost of the Uni
versity of Maryland in 1870. His poetry has much
carefulness, nicety in the use of words, and beauty
of sentiment. His most popular poems in former days
were The Last of the Hours, God's Acres, Truth and
Reason, and The Blessed Hand.
THE BLESSED HAND.*
For you and me, who love the light
Of God's uncloistered day,
It were indeed a dreary lot
To shut ourselves away
5 From every glad and sunny thing
And pleasant sight and sound,
And pass from out a silent cell
Into the silent ground.
Not so the good monk. Anselm, thought,
10 For, in his cloister's shade,
The cheerful faith that lit his heart
Its own sweet sunshine made;
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 95
And in its glow he prayed and wrote,
From matin song* till even,
15 And trusted, in the Book of Life,
To read his name in heaven.
What holy books his gentle art
Filled full of saintly lore!
What pages, brightened by his hand,
The splendid missals* bore !
What blossoms, almost fragrant, twined
Around each blessed name,
And how his Saviour's cross and crown
Shone out from cloud and flame !
-5 But unto clerk as unto clown
One summons comes, alway,
And. Brother Anselm heard the call
At vesper chime,* one day.
His busy pen was in his hand,
so His parchment by his side —
He bent him o'er the half-writ prayer,
Kissed Jesu's name, and died!
They laid him where a window's blaze
Flashed o'er the graven stone,
35 And seemed to touch his simple name
With pencil like his own;
And there he slept, and, one by one,
His brethren died the while,
And trooping years went by and trod
40 His name from off the aisle.
And lifting up the pavement then,
An Abbot's couch to spread,
They let the jeweled sunshine in
Where once lay Anselm's head.
96 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
45 No crumbling bone was there, no trace
Of human dust that told;
But, all alone, a warm right hand
Lay, fresh, upon the mold.
It was not stiff, as dead men's are,
60 But, with a tender clasp,
It seemed to hold an unseen hand
Within its living grasp ;
And ere the trembling monks could turn
To hide their dazzled eyes^
55 It rose, as with a sound of wings,
Right up into the skies !
O loving, open hands that give,
Soft hands, the tear that dry,
O patient hands that toil to bless—
60 How can ye ever die !
Ten thousand vows from yearning hearts
To heaven's own gates shall soar,
And bear you up, as Anselm's hand
Those unseen angels bore !
65 Kind hands! O never near to you
May come the woes ye heal !
O never may the hearts ye guard,
The griefs ye comfort, feel!
May He in whose sweet name ye build
70 So crown the work ye rear
That ye may never clasped be
In one unanswered prayer !
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 97
AMELIA WELBY.
(1819-1852.)
Amelia Welby is a poet who has deserved much more
fame than is now hers. She was born at St. Michael's,
Maryland ; but after 1834 she lived at Louisville, Ken
tucky, where she married a prosperous merchant,
George B. Welby. About 1837 some remarkably
sweet and dainty bits of verse began to appear under
the simple name "Amelia," and the appearance of her
first volume, Poems by Amelia, was greeted by a large
number of readers. The promise of her early work
was not fulfilled ; for she died in her thirty-third year.
TWILIGHT AT SEA.
The twilight hours like birds flew by,
As lightly and as free ;
Ten thousand stars were in the sky,
Ten thousand on the sea ;
5 For every wave, with dimpled face,
That leaped upon the air,
Had caught a star in its embrace
And held it trembling there.*
To A SEA SHELL.
Shell of the bright sea waves,
What is it that we hear in thy sad moan ?*
Is this unceasing music all thine own,
Lute of the ocean caves?
98 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
•'Tis vain — thou answerest not!
Thou hast no voice to whisper of the dead ;
15 Tis ours alone, with sighs like odors shed,
To hold them un forgot.
THEODORE O'HARA.
(1820-1867.)
Again we come to a poet made famous by one song.
In walking through some of our great national ceme
teries, who has not been struck by the appropriateness
of the poetry engraved upon the tablets? Probably
lines from The Bivouac of the Dead are now more
familiar than verses from any other American poem.
The author was born at Danville, Kentucky, entered
the United States army in 1846, served through the
Mexican War, and was a colonel in the Confederate
army. His only famous poem was written in memory
of the Kentucky soldiers who died at the battle of
Buena Vista.
THE BIVOUAC OF THE DEAD.
The muffled drum's sad roll has beat
• The soldier's last tattoo ;
No more on life's parade shall meet
That brave and fallen few.
5 On Fame's eternal camping-ground
Their silent tents are spread,
And Glory guards, with solemn round,
The bivouac of the dead.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 99
No rumor of the foe's advance
Now swells upon the wind;
No troubled thought at midnight haunts
Of loved ones left behind;
No vision of the morrow's strife
The warrior's dream alarms;
No braying horn nor screaming- fife
At dawn shall call to arms.
Their ^shivered swords are red with rust,
Their plumed heads are bowed ;
Their haughty banner, trailed in dust,
Is now their martial shroud.
And plenteous funeral tears have washed
The red stains from each brow,
And the proud forms, by battle gashed,
Are free from anguish now.
25 The neighing troop, the flashing blade,
The bugle's stirring blast,
The charge, the dreadful cannonade,
The din and shout, are past ;
Nor war's wild note nor glory's peal
Shall thrill with fierce delight
Those breasts that never more may feel
The rapture of the fight.
Like the fierce northern hurricane
^ That sweeps this great plateau,
5 Flushed with triumph yet to gain,
Came down the serried foe.*
Who heard the thunder of the fray
Break o'er the field beneath
Knew well the watchword of that day
Was "Victory or death."
40 Long had the doubtful conflict raged*
O'er all that stricken plain,
100 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
For never fiercer fight had waged
The vengeful blood of Spain;
45 And still the storm of battle blew,
Still swelled the gory tide ;
Not long, our stout old chieftain* knew,
Such odds his strength coufd bide.
'Twas in that hour his stern command
50 Called to a martyr's grave
The flower of his beloved band
The nation's flag to save.
By rivers of their fathers' gore
His firstborn laurels grew,
55 And well he deemed the sons would pour
Their lives for glory too.
Full many a norther's breath has swept
O'er Angostura's* plain—
And long the pitying sky has wept
60 Above its moldering slam.
The raven's scream, or eagle's flight,
Or shepherd's pensive lay^
Alone awakes each sullen height
That frowned o'er that dread fray.
65 Sons of the Dark and Bloody Ground,*
Ye must not slumber there,
Where stranger steps and tongues resounc
Along the heedless air.
Your own proud land's heroic soil
™ Shall be your fitter grave ;
She claims from War his richest spoil-
The ashes of her brave.
Thus 'neath their parent turf they rest,
Far from the gory field ;
« Borne to a Spartan mother s breast*
On many a bloody shield ;
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN ;P02TR.Y, . ... IOI
The sunlight of their native sky
Smiles sadly on them here,
And kindred eyes and hearts watch by
80 The heroes' sepulcher.
Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead,
Dear as the blood ye gave ;
No impious footstep here shall tread
The herbage of your grave ;
85 Nor shall your glory be forgot
While Fame her record keeps,
Or Honor points the hallowed spot
Where Valor proudly sleeps.
Yon marble minstrel's voiceless stone
90 In deathless song shall tell,
When many a vanished age hath flown,,
The story how ye fell;
Nor wreck, nor change, nor winter's blight,
Nor Time's remorseless doom,
95 Shall dim one ray of glory's light
That gilds your glorious tomb.
IV.
THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD.
(1850-1875.)
GENERAL SURVEY.
Here is a period that opened in anger and war and
closed in sorrow and poyerty. Scarcely in all history
can so complete and so devastating a change be shown.
The entire social, economic, and political system was
destroyed for all time, and amid the ruins hope seemed
forever lost. A vast horde of ignorant slaves were
suddenly vested with the right of suffrage; once fer
tile fields were changed to deserted wildernesses; a
great wealth had become a pitiable poverty; a section
once powerful in the political history of the nation had
almost lost the common right of self-government. Far
more terrible was the fact that the young manhood
of the nation had largely perished from the earth ; and
there remained but a wretched remnant of a once proud
and cultured people to build upon the widespread
ruins.
Yet from such environments there began to arise a
new empire, stronger and nobler because of the in
tense suffering through which its founders had passed.
Then, too, it was based more nearly upon the legal
equality of men and the dignity of labor. It was all a
time of untold hardships and bitter discouragements,
but untiring efforts. The history can be traced in the
literature of the period. At first we have the valiant
call to arms, and at the last the no less valiant call to
labor. In those days the poetry of the South reached
its noblest heights. Such men as Timrod, Hayne, and
106 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Lanier, forgetting their own sufferings, used the God-
given gift within them for the arousing, the encour
agement, the inspiration of their disheartened country
men. In the real emotions and real pain of the day
the daintiness and artificiality of Southern poetry large
ly disappeared, and singers sang with naturalness and
true effect. But let these singers tell their own story.
PLANTATION MELODIES.
Doubtless the most spontaneous outburst of song
known to modern days is found in the plantation melo
dies of the American negro. Unfortunately — for our
poetry at least — the United States sprang into exist
ence a civilized, intelligent, prosaic nation, almost en
tirely devoid of the national body of folklore which
every great European people considers a priceless
treasure of antiguity. Of all the peoples composing
this nation, the negro alone has created a species of
lyric verse that all the world may recognize as a dis
tinctly American production.
The black man is undoubtedly the best natural musi
cian and orator among modern peoples. Song is to
him the very soul of life: it is an ever-present com
panion; it is a helper in toil, a pastime in idleness, a
comforter in the time of sorrow. How strange, how
weird are his harmonies, so unmodern, so redolent of
an age long past! Amid the throb of the roaring
streets, down on the gray sweltering dock, and far
away at the cabin door by the cotton field, the same
melodies are arising — the folk songs of a people united
by their love of music. There is always present a note
of sadness, although the actual words may have some
thing of gayety. The "coon song," invented by the
white man, is not of the same class ; nor are the beauti
ful lyrics, Suwanee Ribbcr and Old Kentucky Home,
native negro melodies. In their half - expressed
(107)
108 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
thoughts, their minor keys, their swaying rhythm, and
their unexpected endings, the plantation songs defy
imitation.
MOURNER'S SONG.*
I am sinking,
I am sinking,
I am sinking
Down in death!
5 Lord, have mercy,
Lord, have mercy,
Lord, have mercy
On my soul!
ROLL, JORDAN, ROLL.*
My bruddah sittin' on de tree of life,
10 An' he hyeah when Jordan roll.
Roll, Jordan,
Roll, Jordan.
Roll, Jordan, roll.
O, march de angel march.
15 O my soul, rise in heaven, Lord,
Fah to hyeah when Jordan roll !
Little chil'en, learn to feah de Lord,
An' let youah days be long,*
Roll, Jordan, etc.
20 O let no false nah spiteful word
Be found upon youah tongue.
Roll, Jordan, etc.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 109
HEAVEN.
I ain't been thah.
But I'se been tole
25 (Histe de window, let de dove come in!)*
The gates am pearl.
The streets am gole
(Histe de window, let de dove come in!).
SWING Low, SWEET CHARIOT.*
O, de good ole chariot swing so low,
30 I don't want to leave me behind.
O, swing low, sweet chariot,
Swing low, sweet chariot,
I don't want to leave me behind.
O, de good ole chariot will take us all home,
85 I don't want to leave me behind.
O, swing low, sweet chariot, etc.
THE DEAD.
I has a fathah ovah yondah,
I has a fathah ovah yondah,
I has a fathah ovah yondah,
40 Way ovah in de promise Ian'!
By an' by I'll go to see him,
By an' by I'll go to see him,
By an' by I'll go to see him,
Way ovah thah !
45 I has a mothah ovah yondah, etc.
I has a brothah ovah yondah, etc.
(Thus the song continues until all the numerous rela
tives are remembered.)
110 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
IN DE MORNIN'.
In de morning
In de morning
Chil'en? Yes, my Lord!
60 Don't you hyeah de trumpet soun'?
If I had a-died when I was young,
I nevah would had de race fah to run,
Don't you hyeah de trumpet soun' ?
O, Sam and Petah was a-fishm' in de sea,
55 And dey drop de net and follow my Lord.
Don't you hyeah, etc.
Dah's a silvah spade* fah to dig my grave,
An' a gol'en chain fah to let me down.
Don't you hyeah de trumpet soun'?
60 In de mornin',
In de mornin',
Chil'en? Yes, my Lord!
Don't you hyeah de trumpet soun' ?
SAVANNAH FREEMAN'S SONG.
Heave away! Heave away!
65 I'd rathah court a yellow gal dan work
Fah Henry Clay.
Heave away! Heave away!
Yellow gal, I want to go,
I'd rather court a yellow gal, etc.
70 Heave away !
Yellow gal, I want to go.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. I I I
LAY Dis BODY DOWN.*
I knows moon-rise, I knows star-rise,
Lay dis body down;
I walks in de moonlight, I walks in de starlight,
Lay dis body down.
I walks in de graveyard, I walks troo de graveyard,
Lay dis body down.
I goes to de judgment in de evenin' of de day,
When I lays dis body down ;
An' my soul and youah soul will meet in de day
When I lays dis body down.
STARS BEGIN TO FALL.
I fink I hyeah my brothah say,
Call de nation great and small ;
I looks on de God's right han'
When de stahs begin to fall.
O, what a mournin', sistah —
O, what a mournin', brothah —
O, what a mournin',
When de stahs begin to fall !
CIVIL WAR SONGS.
The number of songs — i. e., poems to be set to music
— written especially to aid the Confederate cause is
very small. Many songs, of course, were sung in
camp; but they were, for the most part, old familiar
tunes long heard about the fireside and in the field.
Dixie was a favorite in every regiment; but as it was
112 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
written by Daniel Emmett, of Ohio, and was sung on
New York stages two years before it reached the
South, it cannot be classified as a Southern produc
tion. The same may be said of Old Kentucky Home
and Snwanee Ribber, written by Stephen Foster, a
native of Pennsylvania. In the Union camp there
were dozens of songs written especially for the war,
songs of all characters from the stirring Battle Cry of
Freedom to Julia Ward Howe's dignified hymn : "Mine
eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord."
But it must not be inferred that the Confederate army
was absolutely destitute of songs; it simply lacked a
plentiful supply of song written especially for the
movement. Among the few were Pike's Southrons,
Hear Your Country Call You, Randall's Maryland,
My Maryland, and the ones given below, the authors
of some of which are not known.
CALL ALL.
Whoop ! the Doodles have broken loose,
Roaring round like the very deuce !
Lice of Egypt,* a hungry pack-
After 'em, boys, and drive 'em back.
Bulldog, terrier, cur, and fice.
Back to the beggarly land of ice ;
Worry 'em, bite 'em, scratch and tear
Everybody and everywhere.
Old Kentucky is caved from under,*
Tennessee is split asunder,*
Alabama awaits attack,
And Georgia bristles up her back.
20
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 113
Old John Brown is dead and gone!*
Still his spirit* is marching on—
Lantern-jawed, and legs, my boys,
Long as an ape's from Illinois !*
Want a weapon? Gather a brick,*
Club or cudgel, or stone or stick ;
Anything with a blade or butt,
Anything that can cleave or cut.
Anything heavy, or hard, or keen !
Any sort of slaying machine !
Anything with a willing mind,
And the steady arm of a man behind.
25 Want a weapon ? Why, capture one !
Every Doodle has got a gun,
Belt, and bayonet, bright and new;
Kill a Doodle, and capture two!
Shoulder to shoulder, son and sire!
All, call all to the feast of fire !
Mother and maiden, and child and slave,
A common triumph or a single grave.
THE BONNIE BLUE FLAG.*
We are a band of brothers, and native to the soil,
Fighting for the property we gained by honest toil ;
And when our rights were threatened, the cry rose
near and far:
Hurrah for the bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single
star!
Hurrah ! hurrah ! for the bonnie Blue Flag
That bears a single star !
8
114 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
As long as the Union was faithful to her trust,
40 Like friends and like brothers, kind were we and
just;
But now when Northern treachery attempts our
rights to mar,
We hoist on high the bonnie Blue Flag that bears a
single star.
First, gallant South Carolina nobly made the stand ;
Then came Alabama, who took her by the hand ;
45 Next, quickly Mississippi, Georgia, and Florida-
All raised the flag, the bonnie Blue Flag that bears
a single star.
Ye men of valor, gather round the banner of the
right ;
Texas and fair Louisiana join us in the fight.
Davis, our loved President, and Stephens, statesmen
are;
50 Now rally round the bonnie Blue Flag that bears
a single star.
And here's to brave Virginia! the Old Dominion
State
With the young Confederacy at length has linked
her fate.
Impelled by her example, now other States prepare
To hoist on high the bonnie Blue Flag that bears
a single star.
55 Then here's to our Confederacy ! strong we are and
brave,
Like patriots of old we'll fight, our heritage to save ;
And rather than submit to shame, to die we would
prefer ;
So cheer for the bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single
star.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 115
Then cheer, boys, cheer, raise the joyous shout,
3 For Arkansas and North Carolina now have both
gone out;
And let another rousing cheer for Tennessee be
given,
The single star of the bonnie Blue Flag has grown
to be eleven !
Hurrah ! hurrah ! for the bonnie Blue Flag
That bears a single star.
THE SOLDIER BOY.*
65 I give my soldier boy a blade
In fair Damascus* fashioned well.
Who first the glittering falchion swayed,
Who first beneath its fury fell,
I know not ; but I hope to know
That for no mean or hireling trade,
To guard no feeling base or low,
I give my soldier boy a blade.
Cool, calm, and clear, the lucid flood
In which its tempering work was done ;
75 As calm, as cool, as clear of mood
Be thou, whene'er it sees the sun ;
For country's claim, at honor's call,
For outraged friend, insulted maid,
At mercy's voice to bid it fall,
80 I give my soldier boy a blade.
The eye which marked its peerless edge,*
The hand that weighed its balanced poise,
Anvil and pincers, forge and wedge,
Are gone with all their flame and noise ;
85 And still the gleaming sword remains.
So when in dust I low am laid,
Remember by these heartfelt strains "
I give my soldier boy a blade.
Il6 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
MARGARET PRESTON.
(1820-1897.)
Margaret Preston was the daughter of Dr. Junkin,
founder of Lafayette College, and was born at Phila
delphia. When she was twenty-eight years old her
father became president of Washington (afterwards
Washington and Lee) College, and from that time
forth she resided in Virginia. She married Colonel
J. T. L. Preston, a professor in the Virginia Military
Institute, at Lexington. Her first volume of poetry
was the highly popular Bccchenbrook: A Rhyme of
the War, published in 1866. This was followed by
several other volumes., among the most widely known
being Old Songs and New (1870) and Colonial Bal
lads (1887). There are true poetic qualities in her
work—simplicity, emotion, vividness, melody, and ac
curate choice of words. Her merit has not been recog
nized to the proper extent, for there are in her verse
characteristics of exceptionally high order.
CALLING THE ANGELS IN.1
We mean to do it. Some day, some day,
We mean to slacken this feverish rush
That is wearing our very souls away,
And grant to our hearts a hush
'These selections are used with the permission of Dr.
George J. Preston, Baltimore.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 1 17
5 That is only enough to let them hear
The footsteps of angels drawing near.*
We mean to do it. Oh, never doubt,
When the burden of daytime broil is o'er,
We'll sit and muse while the stars come out,
10 As the patriarchs sat in the door
Of their tents with a heavenward-gazing eye,
To watch for angels passing by.
We've seen them afar at high noontide,
When fiercely the world's hot flashings beat;
15 Yet never have bidden them turn aside
To tarry in converse sweet ;
Nor prayed them to hallow the cheer we spread,
To drink of our wine and break our bread.
We promise our hearts that when the stress
20 Of the life work reaches the longed-for close,
When the weight that we groan with hinders less,
We'll welcome such calm repose
As banishes care's disturbing din,
And then — we'll call the angels in.
25 The day that we dreamed of comes at length,
When, tired of every mocking guest,
And broken in spirit and shorn of strength,
We drop at the door of rest,
And wait and watch as the day wanes on —
30 But the angels we meant to call are gone !
Il8 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
THE HERO OF THE COMMUNE.*
"Gargon !* you — you
Snared along with this cursed crew ?
(Only a child, and yet so bold,
Scarcely as much as ten years old!)
Do you hear ? do you know
Why the gendarmes put you there, in the row,
You, with those Commune wretches tall.
With your face to the wall?"
"Know ? To be sure I know ! why not ?
40 We're here to be shot ;
And there, by the pillar, 's the very spot.
Fighting for France, my father fell !
' Ah, well !
That's just the way I would choose to fall,
45 With my back to the wall !"
"(Sacre!* Fair, open fight, I say,
Is something right gallant in its way,
And fine for warming the blood ; but who
Wants wolfish work like this to do?
50 Bah! 'tis a butcher's business!) How?
(The boy is beckoning to me now !
I knew that his poor child's heart would fail,
. . . Yet his cheek's not pale!)
Quick ! say your say, for don't you see,
85 When the church clock yonder tolls out three,
You're all to be shot?
. . . What?
'Excuse you one moment ?' O, ho, ho !
Do you think to fool a gendarme so ?"
60 "But, sir, here's a watch that a friend one day
(My father's friend), just over the way,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 119
Lent me ; and if you'll let me free —
It still lacks seven minutes of three —
I'll come, on the word of a soldier's son,
65 Straight back into line, when my errand's done."
"Ha, ha ! No doubt of it ! Off ! Begone !
(Now, good Saint Denis,* speed him on!
The work will be easier since he's saved;
For I hardly see how I could have braved
70 The ardor of that innocent eye,
As he stood and heard,
While I gave the word,
Dooming him like a dog to die.)"
"In time ! well, thanks, that my desire
75 Was granted ; and now, I am ready ! Fire !
One word ! — that's all !
You'll let me turn my back to the wall ?"
"Parbleu !* Come out of the line, I say,
Come out! (Who said that his name was Ney?*)
80 Ha ! France will hear of him yet one day !"
THE SHADE OF THE TREES.
(On the death of Stonewall Jackson, 1863, his last words
being, "Let us pass over the river and rest under the shade
of the trees/')
What are the thoughts that are stirring his breast?
What is the mystical vision he sees ?
"Let us pass over the river and rest
Under the shade of the trees."
85 Has he grown sick of his toils and his tasks ?
Sighs the worn spirit for respite or ease?
120 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Is it a moment's cool halt that he asks
Under the shade of the trees ?
Is it the gurgle of waters whose flow
90 Ofttime has come to him borne on the breeze,
Memory listens to, lapsing so low,
Under the shade of the trees?
Nay — though the rasp of the flesh was so sore,
Faith, that had yearnings far keener than these,*
95 Saw the soft sheen of the Thitherward Shore,
Under the shade of the trees;—
Caught the high psalms of ecstatic delight,
Heard the harps harping like soundings of seas.
Watched earth's assoiled ones walking in white
100 Under the shade of the trees.
O, was it strange he should pine for release,
Touched to the soul with such transports as these,
He who so needed the balsam of peace,
Under the shade of the trees?
105 yes, it was noblest for him — it was best
(Questioning naught of our Father's decrees)
There to pass over the river and rest
Under the shade of the trees !
A GRAVE IN HOLLYWOOD CEMETERY, RICHMOND.*
I read the marble-lettered name,
110 And half in bitterness I said:
"As Dante* from Ravenna came,
Our poet came from exile — dead."
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. H
And yet, had it been asked of him
Where he would rather lay his head,
115 This spot he would have chosen. Dim
The city's hum drifts o'er his grave,
And green above the hollies wave
Their jagged leaves, as when a boy,
On blissful summer afternoons,'
120 He came to sing the birds his runes
And tell the river of his joy.
Who dreams that in his wanderings wide,
By stern misfortunes tossed and driven,
His soul's electric strands were riven
25 From home and country ? Let betide
What might, what would, his boast, his pride,
Was in his stricken motherland,
That could but bless and bid him go,
Because no crust was in her hand
To stay her children's need. We know
The mystic cable* sank too deep
For surface storm or stress to strain,
Or from his answering heart to keep
The spark from flashing back again !
135 Think of the thousand mellow rhymes,*
The pure idyllic passion-flowers,
Wherewith, in far-gone, happier times,
He garlanded this South of ours.
Provengal-like,* he wandered long,
And sang at many a stranger's board,
Yet 'twas Virginia's* name that poured
The tenderest pathos through his song.
We owe the Poet praise and tears,
Whose ringing ballad* sends the brave,
45 Bold Stuart* riding down the years—
What have we given him ? Just a grave !
122 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
THERE'LL COME A DAY.
There'll come a day when the supremest splendor
Of earth or sky or sea,
Whate'er their miracles, sublime or tender,
150 Will wake no joy in me.
There'll come a day when all the aspiration,
Now with such fervor fraught
As lifts to heights of breathless exaltation,
Will seem a thing of naught.
155 There'll come a day when riches, honor, glory,
Music and song and art,
Will look like puppets in a worn-out story,
Where each has played his part.
There'll come a day when human love, the sweetest
160 Gift that includes the whole
Of God's grand giving — sovereignest, completest —
Shall fail to fill my soul.
There'll come a day — I shall not care how passes
The cloud across my sight,
165 If only, lark-like, from earth's nested grasses,
I spring to meet its light.
FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR.
(1822-1874.)
Very little is known concerning Francis Ticknor.
He was a quiet, hard-working country physician, whose
productions were seen very frequently in Southern
magazines of the war period; but his poems did not
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 123
receive wide notice until they were collected in a well-
edited volume (1879), with an introduction by Paul
Hamilton Hayne. Ticknor was a native of Georgia,
studied medicine in New York and Philadelphia, and
practiced his profession near Columbus, Georgia.
There is no small amount of earnestness and sincerity
in all his work, and a real lyric quality that caused
Hayne to say that he was "one of the truest and sweet
est lyric poets this country has yet produced."
LITTLE GIFFEN.*
Out of the focal and foremost fire.
Out of the hospital walls as dire,
Smitten of grapeshot and gangrene,
Eighteenth battle and he sixteen —
5 Specter such as you seldom see,
Little Giffen of Tennessee.
"Take him and welcome," the surgeon said ;
"Not the doctor can help the dead !"
So we took him and brought him where
10 The balm was sweet in our summer air ;
And we laid him down on a wholesome bed ;
Utter Lazarus,* heel to head!
And we watched the war with abated breath,
Skeleton boy against skeleton death !
15 Months of torture, how many such !
Weary weeks of the stick and crutch, —
And still a glint in the steel-blue eye
Told of a spirit that wouldn't die,
And didn't! Nay! more! in death's despite
20 The crippled skeleton learned to write —
124 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
"Dear Mother!" at first, of course, and then
''Dear Captain !" inquiring about the men.
Captain's answer: "Of eighty and five,
Giffen and I are left alive." '
25 "Johnston* pressed at the front," they say;—
Little Giffen was up and away !
A^tear, his first, as he bade good-by,
Dimmed the glint of his steel-blue eye.
"I'll write, if spared !" There was news of fight,
5 But none of Giffen — he did not write !
I sometimes fancy that were I King
Of the courtly Knights of Arthur's ring,*
With the voice of the minstrel in mine' ear
And the tender legend that trembles here,
35 I'd give the best on his bended knee —
The whitest soul of my chivalry —
For Little Giffen of Tennessee.
VIRGINIANS OF THE VALLEY.*
The knightliest of the knightly race
That, since the days of old,
40 Have kept the lamp of chivalry
Alight in hearts of gold ;
The kindliest of the kindly band
That, rarely hating ease,
Yet rode with Raleigh* round the land,
With Smith* around the seas.
Who climbed the blue embattled hills
Against uncounted foes,
And planted there, in valleys fair,
The lily and the rose ;
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 125
50 Whose fragrance lives in many lands,
Whose beauty stars the earth,
And lights the hearths of happy homes
With loveliness and worth !
We thought they slept ! — the men who kept
55 The names of noble sires,
And slumbered while the darkness crept
Around their vigil fires !
But aye the Golden Horseshoe Knights*
Their Old Dominion keep,
60 Whose foes have found enchanted ground,
But not a knight asleep.
JOHN REUBEN THOMPSON.
(1823-1873.)
We hear little to-day of John Reuben Thompson,
although during this period he was perhaps the best-
known occasional poet in the South. Perhaps his
poems were so timely in their own day that they do not
fit these times. He was born at Richmond, Virginia,
and was educated at the University of Virginia. In
1847 ne became editor of the Southern Literary Mes
senger and held the position for twelve years. In 1863
he went to England, and during the years spent there
was a frequent contributor to English magazines. He
was for some time literary editor of the New York
Evening Post. As a lecturer and critic he won con
siderable notice, while his poems were highly popular
in their day.
126 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Music IN CAMP.*
Two armies covered hill and plain,
Where Rappahannock's* waters
Ran deeply crimsoned with the stain
Of battle's recent slaughters.
5 The summer clouds lay pitched like tents
In meads of heavenly azure;
And each dread gun of the elements
Slept in its embrasure.
The breeze so softly blew it made
10 No forest leaf to quiver,
And the smoke of the random cannonade
Rolled slowly from the river.
And now, where circling hills looked down
With cannon grimly planted,
15 O'er listless camp and silent town
The golden sunset slanted.
When on the fervid air there came
A strain — now rich, now tender ;
The music seemed itself aflame
20 With day's departing splendor.
A Federal band, which, eve and morn,
Played measures brave and nimble,
Had just struck up, with flute and horn
And lively clash of cymbal.
25 Down flocked the soldiers to the banks,
Till, margined by its pebbles,
One wooded shore was blue with "Yanks,"
And one was gray with "Rebels."
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 127
Then all was still, and then the band,
With movement light and tricksy,
Made stream and forest, hill and strand,
Reverberate with "Dixie."
The conscious stream with burnished glow
Went proudly o'er its pebbles,
85 But thrilled throughout its deepest flow
With yelling of the Rebels.
Again a pause, and then again
The trumpets pealed sonorous,
And "Yankee Doodle" was the strain
To which the shore gave chorus.
The laughing ripple shoreward flew,
To kiss the shining pebbles ;
Loud shrieked the swarming Boys in Blue
Defiance to the Rebels.
5 And yet once more the bugle sang
Above the stormy riot ;
No shout upon the evening rang —
There reigned a holy quiet.
The sad, slow stream its noiseless flood
Poured o'er the glistening pebbles ;
All silent now the Yankees" stood,
And silent stood the Rebels.
No unresponsive soul had heard
That plaintive note's appealing,
5 So deeply "Home, Sweet Home" had stirred
The hidden founts of feeling.
Or Blue, or Gray, the soldier sees,
As by the wand of fairy,
128 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
The cottage 'neath the live oak trees,
60 The cabin by the prairie.
Or cold, or warm, his native skies
Bend in their beauty o'er him ;
Seen through the tear mist in his eyes,
His loved ones stand before him.
65 As fades the iris* after rain
In April's tearful weather,
The vision vanished, as the strain
And daylight died together.
But memory, waked by music's art,
70 Expressed in simplest numbers,
Subdued the sternest Yankee's heart,
Made light the Rebel's slumbers.
And fair the form of music shines,
That bright celestial creature,
75 Who still, 'mid war's embattled lines,
Gave this one touch of Nature.*
THE BATTLE RAINBOW.*
The warm, weary day was departing— the smile
Of the sunset gave token the tempest had ceased,
And the lightning yet fitfully gleamed for a while
80 On the cloud that sank sullen and dark in the east.
There our army, awaiting the terrible fight
Of the morrow, lay hopeful and watching and
still,
Where their tents all the region had sprinkled with
white,
From river to river, o'er meadow and hill.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 129
85 While above them the fierce cannonade of the sky
Blazed and burst from the vapors that muffled the
sun,
Their "counterfeit clamors" gave forth no reply,
And slept till the battle the charge in each gun.
When lo, on the cloud, a miraculous thing !
00 Broke in beauty the rainbow our host to enfold ;
The center o'erspread by its arch, and each wing
Suffused with its azure and crimson and gold.
Blest omen of victory, symbol divine
Of peace after tumult, repose after pain;
95 How sweet and how glowing with promise the sign
To eyes that should never behold it again !
For the fierce flame of war on the morrow flashed
out,
And its thunder peals filled all the tremulous air :
Over slipp'ry intrenchment and reddened redoubt*
Rang the wild cheer of triumph, the cry of de
spair.
Then a long week of glory and agony came —
Of mute supplication and yearning and dread ;
When day unto day* gave the record of fame,
And night unto night gave the list of its dead.
105We had triumphed— the foe had fled back to his
ships,
His standard in rags and his legions a wreck-
But alas ! the stark faces and colorless lips
Of our loved ones gave triumph's rejoicing a
check.
Not yet, O not yet, as a sign of release,
110 Had the Lord set in mercy his bow in the cloud ;
9
I$0 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Not yet had the Comforter whispered of peace
To the hearts that around us lay bleeding and
bowed.
But the promise was given — the beautiful arc,
With its brilliant confusion of colors that spanned
115 The sky on that exquisite eve, was the mark
Of the Infinite Love overarchin the land !
And that Love, shining richly and full as the day,
Through the tear drops that moisten each mar
tyr's proud pall,
On the gloom of the past the bright bow shall dis
play
Qf Freedom, Peace, Victorv, bent over all.
JAMES MATH EWES LEG ARE.
(1823-1859.)
Very little is known about the life of Legare. He
was born at Charleston, South Carolina, early became
a contributor to magazines, patented several inventions,
published in 1847 ms Orta-Undis, and Other Poems,
and died at Aiken, South Carolina.
AHAB MOHAMMED.
A peasant stood before a king and said,
"My children starve; I come to thee for bread."
On cushions soft and silken sat enthroned
The king, and looked on him that prayed and
moaned,
5 Who cried again, — "For bread I come to thee."
For grief, like wine, the tongue will render free.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 131
Then said the prince with simple truth, "Behold,
I sit on cushions silken-soft; of gold
And wrought with skill the vessels which they bring
1 To fitly grace the banquet of a king.
But at my gate the Mede* triumphant beats,
And die for food my people in the streets.
Yet no good father hears his child complain
And gives him stones for bread,* for alms disdain.
5 Come, thou and I will sup together — come."
The wondering courtiers saw — saw and were dumb !
Then followed with their eyes where Ahab led
With grace the humble guest, amazed, to share his
bread.
Him half abashed the royal host withdrew
Into a room, the curtained doorway through.
Silent behind the folds of purple closed,
In marble life the statues stood disposed;
From the high ceiling, perfume breathing, hung
Lamps rich, pomegranate-shaped, and golden-
swung.
25 Gorgeous the board with massive metal shone,
Gorgeous with gems arose in front a throne :
These through the Orient lattice saw the sun.
If gold there was, of meat and bread was none
Save one small loaf; this stretched his hand and
took
Ahab Mohammed, prayed to God, and broke :
One half his yearning nature bid him crave,
The other gladly to his guest he gave.
"I have no more to give," he cheerily said ;
''With thee I share my only loaf of bread."
3 Humbly the stranger took the offered crumb,
Yet ate not of it, standing meek and dumb ;
Then lifts his eyes — the wondering Ahab saw
His rags fall from him as the snow in thaw.
Resplendent, blue, those orbs upon him turned ;
0 All Ahab's soul within him throbbed and burned.
132 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
"Ahab Mohammed/' spoke the vision then,
"From this thou shalt be blessed among men.
QO forth— thy gates the Mede bewildered flees,
And Allah thank thy people on their knees.
45 He who gives somewhat does a worthy deed,
Of him the recording angel shall take heed ;
But he that halves all that his house doth hold,
His deeds are more to God, yea, more than finest
gold."
To A LILY.*
Go bow thy head in gentle spite,
50 Thou lily white ;
For she who spies thee waving here,
With thee in beauty can compare
As day with night.
Soft are thy leaves and white : her arms
55 Boast whiter charms.
Thy stem prone bent with loveliness
Of maiden grace possesseth less :
Therein she charms.
Thou in thy lake dost see
60 Thyself: so she
Beholds her image in her eyes
Reflected. Thus did Venus* rise
From out the sea.
Inconsolate, bloom not again,
65 Thou rival vain
Of her whose charms have thine outdone,
Whose purity might spot the sun,
And make thy leaf a stain.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 1 33
JAMES BARRON HOPE.
(1827-1887.)
James Barron Hope was born at Norfolk, Virginia,
and, after graduating at William and Mary College,
practiced law. But it seems that he put more zeal
into his literary efforts than into his legal ones. Hav
ing served through the Civil War, he became, like Lee,
an educator, and for some years was superintendent
of schools at Norfolk. He became known as a poet
for occasions, among such being the hundredth anni
versary of the surrender of Cornwallis, the two hun
dred and fiftieth anniversary of the settlement of
Jamestown, the dedication of the Washington monu
ment at Richmond, and the laying of the corner-stone
of the Lee monument at Richmond.
FROM "ARMS AND THE MAN/'1 *
The New England Group.
At Plymouth Rock a handful of brave souls,
Full-armed in faith, erected home and shrine,
And flourished where the wild Atlantic rolls
Its pyramids of brine.
5 There rose a manly race austere and strong,
On whom no lessons of their day were lost,
aThese selections are used with the permission of Mrs.
Janey Hope Marr
134 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Earnest as some conventicle's deep song,
And keen as their own frost.
But that shrewd frost became a friend to those
10 Who fronted there the Ice King's bitter storm,
For see we not that underneath the snows
The growing wheat keeps warm?
Soft ease and silken opulence they spurned;
From sands of silver, and from emerald boughs
15 With golden ingots laden full, they turned
Like Pilgrims under vows.
For them no tropic seas, no slumbrous calms,
No rich abundance generously unrolled:
In place of Cromwell's proffered flow'rs and palms*
20 They chose the long-drawn cold.
The more it blew, the more they faced the gale ;
The more it snowed, the more they would not
freeze ;
And when crops failed on sterile hill and vale,
They went to reap the seas !*
25 Far North, through wild and stormy brine they ran,
With hands a-cold plucked Winter by the locks !
Masterful mastered great Leviathan*
And drove the foam as flocks !
Next in their order came the Middle Group,
30 Perchance less hardy, but as brave they grew, —
Grew straight and tall, with not a bend or stoop —
Heart timber through and through!
Midway between the ardent heat and cold
They spread abroad, and by a homely spell,
35 The iron of their axes changed to gold*
As fast the forests fell !
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 135
Doing the things they found to do, we see
That thus they drew a mighty empire's charts,
And, working for the present, took in fee
40 The future for their marts !
And there unchallenged may the boast be made,
Although they do not hold his sacred dust,
That Penn, the Founder, never once betrayed
The simple Indian's trust!
45 To them the genius which linked Silver Lakes*
With the blue Ocean and the outer World,
And the fair banner, which their commerce shakes,
Wise Clinton's hand unfurled.
The Southern Colonies.
Then sweeping down below Virginia's capes,
co From Chesapeake to where Savannah flows,
We find the settlers laughing 'mid their grapes
And ignorant of snows.
The fragrant uppowock* and golden corn
Spread far afield by river and' lagoon,
55 And all the months poured out from Plenty's Horn*
Were opulent as June.
Yet they had tragedies all dark and fell !
Lone Roanoke Island* rises on the view,
And this Peninsula its tale could tell
co Of Opecancanough !*
But when the Ocean thunders on the shore,
Its waves, though broken, overflow the beach;
So here our Fathers on and onward bore
With English laws and speech.
I36 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY^
65 Kind skies above them, underfoot rich soils ;
Silence and savage at their presence fled ; _
This Giant's Causeway,, sacred through their t Us,
Resounded at their tread.
With ardent hearts and ever-open hands,
™ Candid and honest, brave and proud they grew,
Their lives and habits colored by fair hands
As skies give waters hue.
The race in semi-feudal* state appears—
Their knightly figures glow in tender mist,
" With ghostly pennons flung ^from ghostly spears
And ghostly hawks on wrist.
Bv enterprise and high adventure stirred,
'From rude lunette and sentry-guarded croft
They hawked at Empire, and, as they spurred,
80 Fate's falcon soared aloft!
Fate's falcon soared aloft full strong and free,
With blood on talons, plumage, beak, and breasi
Her shadow like a storm-shade on the sea
Far-sailing down the West!
« Swift hoofs clang out behind that Falcon's flights-
Hoofs shod with Golden Horse Shoes- catch the
eve !
And as they ring, we see the Forest Knights—
The Cavaliers* ride by !
FROM "THE CHARGE AT BALAKLAVA."*
All that morning they had waited,
»° As their frowning faces showed:
Horses stamping, riders fretting,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 137
And their teeth together setting,
Not a single sword blade wetting,
As the battle ebbed and flowed.
95 Brightly gleam six hundred sabres,
And the brazen trumpets ring;
Steeds are gathered, spurs are driven,
And the heavens wildly riven
With a mad shout upward given,
Scaring vultures on the wing.
And to-night the moon shall shudder
As she looks down on the moor
Where the dead of hostile races
Slumber, slaughtered in their places :
05 All their rigid, ghastly faces
Spattered hideously with gore.
THREE SUMMER STUDIES.
I.
The cock hath crowed. I hear the doors unbarred ;
Down to the moss-grown porch my way I take,
And hear, beside the well within the yard,
110 Full many an ancient, quacking, splashing drake,
And gabbling goose, and noisy brood hen — all
Responding to yon strutting gobbler's call.
The dew is thick upon the velvet grass —
The porch rails hold it in translucent drops,
115 And as the cattle from th' inclosure pass,
Each one, alternate, slowly halts and crops
The tall, green spears, with all their dewy load,
Which grow beside the well-known pasture road.
138 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
A lustrous polish is on all the leaves —
120 The birds flit in and out with varied notes —
The noisy swallows twitter 'neath the eaves —
A partridge whistle through the garden floats.
While yonder gaudy peacock harshly cries,
As red and gold flush all the eastern skies.
125 Up comes the sun: through the dense leaves a spot
Of splendid light drinks up the dew ; the breeze
Which late made leafy music dies; the day grows
hot,
And slumbrous sounds come from marauding
bees ;
The burnished river like a sword blade shines.
130 Save where 'tis shadowed by the solemn pines.
II.
Over the farm is brooding silence now —
No reaper's song, no raven's clangor harsh,
No bleat of sheep, no distant low of cow,
No croak of frogs within the spreading marsh,
135 No bragging cock from littered farmyard crows —
The scene is steeped in silence and repose.
A trembling haze hangs over all the fields —
The panting cattle in the river stand,
Seeking the coolness which its wave scarce yields.
140 It seems a Sabbath through the drowsy land :
So hushed is all beneath the Summer's spell,
I pause and listen for some faint church bell.
The leaves are motionless, the song bird's mute —
The very air seems somnolent and sick :
145 The spreading branches with o'erripened fruit
Show in the sunshine all their clusters thick,
While now and then a mellow apple falls
With a dull sound within the orchard's walls.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 139
The sky has ,but one solitary cloud,
150 Like a dark island in a sea of light ;
The parching furrows 'twixt the corn rows plowed
Seem fairly dancing in my dazzled sight,
While over yonder road a dusty haze
Grows reddish purple in the sultry blaze.
III.
155 That solitary cloud grows dark and wide,
While distant thunder rumbles in the air,
A fitful ripple breaks the river's tide —
The lazy cattle are no longer there,
But homeward come in long procession slow,
160 With many a bleat and many a plaintive low.
Darker and wider spreading o'er the west
Advancing clouds, each in fantastic form,
And mirrored turrets on the river's breast
Tell in advance the coming of a storm —
165 Closer and brighter glares the lightning's flash,
And louder, nearer, sounds the thunder's crash.
The air of evening is intensely hot,
The breeze feels heated as it fans my brows ;
Now sullen raindrops patter down like shot,
170 Strike in the grass, or rattle 'mid the boughs.
A sultry lull, and then a gust again,
And now I see the thick-advancing rain.
It fairly hisses as it comes along,
And where it strikes bounds up again in spray
175 As if 'twere dancing to the fitful song
Made by the trees, which twist themselves and
sway
In contest with the wind which rises fast
Until the breeze becomes a furious blast.
140 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
And now the sudden, fitful storm has fled ;
180 The clouds lie piled up in the splendid west,
In massive shadow tipped with purplish red,
Crimson or gold. The scene is one of rest ;
And on the bosom of yon still lagoon
I see the crescent of the pallid moon.
SUNSET ON HAMPTON ROADS.*
185 Behind me purplish lines marked out the town;
Before me stretched the noble Roadstead's tide:
And there I saw the Evening sun go down,
Casting a parting glory far and wide —
As King who for the cowl puts off his crown—
190 So went the sun, and left a wealth of light
Ere hidden by the cloister gates of Night.
Beholding this, my soul was stilled in prayer ;
I understood how all men, save the blind,
Might find religion in a scene so fair
195 And formulate a creed within the mind ;
See prophecies in clouds, fates in the air.
The skies flamed red, the murm'ring waves were
hushed —
"The conscious water saw its God and blushed."
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 141
HENRY TIMROD.
(1829-1867.)
The South has contributed to the roll of those that
have made American literature worthy at least four
names: Poe, Timrod, Hayne, and Lanier. The story
of the life of each one is full of privations, afflictions,
and great sorrows ; but Timrod's cup of existence was
filled to the very brim with vain endeavors and dis
appointments. He was born at Charleston, South
Carolina, of cultured, versatile, and influential par
ents, and was educated in private schools of Charles
ton and at the University of Georgia. He studied law,
but did not practice it. For ten years he was a pri
vate tutor near his home city ; but in his various litera
ry efforts he was far more enthusiastic and successful.
He served during a part of the war as a field corre
spondent for a Charleston paper, and in 1864 became
associate editor of the South Carolinian, published at
Columbia. He married; a son was born to him; his
paper prospered ; he established a comfortable home.
Within a year General Sherman's army had destroyed
his printing office; his boy had died; and he found
himself a destitute invalid. He sold his furniture to
buy food and medicine. In 1867 some friends sent
him to visit Paul Hamilton Hayne at Copse Hill, Geor
gia; but the trip gave him no permanent relief. He
died shortly after his return to Columbia, in 1867.
Timrod was a most sincere lover of Nature, as may
be seen in almost every one of his poems; and with
I42 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
this characteristic must be associated the beauty and
depth of his thought. There is often a real originality
in his point of view. His imagination was broad and
rich, while the sufferings of his own life gave him a
mingled gentleness and sadness. From a technical
standpoint, too, Timrod's verse is of high excellence.
Oftentimes there is an extraordinary energy of expres
sion, especially in his war lyrics. He was something
of a master in his use of melodious words, and he
summoned to his assistance every possible means
imagery, figures of speech, archaic words, bold com
parisons, rhyme, and assonance. Richard Henry Stod-
dard speaks of him as "the ablest poet the South has
yet produced."
SONNET.1 *
Most men know love but as a part of life ;
They hide it in some corner of the breast,
Even from themselves; and only when they rest
In the brief pauses of that daily strife,
5 Wherewith the world might else be not so rife,
They draw it forth (as one draws forth a toy
To soothe some ardent, kiss-exacting boy)
And hold it up to sister, child, or wife.
Ah me ! why may not love and life be one ?
Why walk we thus alone, when by our side
Love, like a visible God, might be our guide ?
How would the marts grow noble ! and the street,
Worn like a dungeon floor by weary feet,
Seem then a golden court-way of the Sun !
1These selections are used with the special permission of
B. F. Johnson Publishing Company, authorized publishers of
Timrod's poems.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 143
THE SUMMER BOWER.*
15 It is a place whither I have often gone
For peace, and found it, secret, hushed, and cool,
A beautiful recess in neighboring woods.
Trees of the soberest hues, thick-leaved and tall,
Arch it o'erhead and column it around,
Framing a covert, natural and wild,
Domelike and dim ; though nowhere so inclosed
But that the gentlest breezes reach the spot
Unwearied and unweakened. Sound is here
A transient and unfrequent visitor;
25 Yet, if the day be calm, not often then,
Whilst the high pines in one another's arms
Sleep, you may sometimes with unstartled ear
Catch the far fall of voices — how remote
You know not, and you do not care to know.
1 The turf is soft and green, but not a flower
Lights the recess, save one, star-shaped and bright —
I do not know its name — which here and there
Gleams like a sapphire set in emerald.
A narrow opening in the branched roof,
35 A single one, is large enough to show,
With that half glimpse a dreamer loves so much.
The blue air and the blessing of the sky.
Thither I always bent my idle steps,
WThen griefs depressed or joys disturbed my heart,
0 And found the calm I looked for, or returned
Strong with the quiet rapture in my soul.
But one day,
One of those July days when winds have fled
One knows not whither, I, most sick in mind
5 With thoughts that shall be nameless— yet no doubt
Wrong, or at least unhealthful, since, though dark
With gloom and touched with discontent, they had
No adequate excuse nor cause nor end —
144 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
I, with these thoughts, and on this summer day,
50 Entered the accustomed haunt, and found for once
No medicinal virtue.
Not a leaf
Stirred with the whispering welcome which I
sought,
But in a close and humid atmosphere
55 Every fair plant and implicated bough
Hung lax and lifeless. Something in the place,
Its utter stillness, the unusual heat,
And some more secret influence, I thought,
Weighed on the sense like sin. Above I saw,
60 Though not a cloud was visible in heaven,
The pallid sky looked through a glazed mist
Like a blue eye in death.
The change, perhaps,
Was natural enough; my jaundiced sight,
65 The weather, and the time explain it all :
Yet have I drawn a lesson from the spot,
And shrined it in these verses for my heart.
Thenceforth those tranquil precincts I have sought
Not less, and in all shades of various moods ;
70 But always shun to desecrate the spot
By vain repinings, sickly sentiments,
Or inconclusive sorrows. Nature, though
Pure as she was in Eden when her breath
Kissed the white brow of Eve, doth not refuse,
75 In her own way and with a just reserve,
To sympathize with human suffering ;
But for the pains, the fever, and the fret
Engendered of a weak, unquiet heart,
She hath no solace ; and who seeks her when
80 These be the troubles over which he moans,
Reads in her unreplying lineaments
Rebukes that, to the guilty consciousness,
Strike like contempt.
THREE^CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 145
CAROLINA.*
I.
The despot treads thy sacred sands,
' Thy pines give shelter to his bands,
Thy sons stand by with idle hands,
Carolina !
He breathes at ease thy airs of balm,
He scorns the lances of thy palm ;
0 O ! who shall break thy craven calm,
Carolina !
Thy ancient fame is growing dim,
A^spot is on thy garment's rim;
Give to the winds thy battle hymn,
Carolina!
II.
Call on thy children of the hill,*
Wake swamp and river, coast and rill,
Rouse all thy strength and all thy skill,
Carolina !
Cite wealth and science, trade and art,
Touch with thy fire the cautious mart,
And pour thee through the people's heart,
Carolina !
Till even the coward spurns his fears,
And all thy fields and fens and meres
Shall bristle like thy palm with spears,
Carolina !
III.
Hold up the glories of thy dead ;
Say how thy elder children bled,
10 And point to Eutaw's battle-bed,*
Carolina !
10
100
105
146 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Tell how the patriot's soul was tried,
And what his dauntless breast defied ;
How Rutledge* ruled and Laurens* died,
115 Carolina !
Cry ! till thy summons, heard at last,
Shall fall like Marion's* bugle blast
Reechoed from the haunted Past,
Carolina !
IV.
120 1 hear a murmur as of waves
That grope their way through sunless caves,
Like bodies struggling in their graves,
Carolina !
And now it deepens; slow and grand
125 It swells, as rolling to the land,
An ocean broke upon thy strand,
Carolina !
Shout ! let it reach the startled Huns !*
And roar with all thy festal guns !
130 It is the answer of thy sons,
Carolina !
V.
They will not wait to hear thee call ;
From Sachem's Head* to Sumter's wall
Resounds the voice of hut and hall,
135 Carolina!
No! than hast not a stain, they say,
Or none save what the battle day
Shall wash in seas of blood away,
Carolina !
140 Thy skirts indeed the foe may part,
Thy robe be pierced with sword and dart ;
They shall not touch thy noble heart,
Carolina !
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 147
VI.
Ere thou shalt own the tyrant's thrall
15 Ten times ten thousand men must fall;
Thy corpse may hearken to his call,
Carolina !
When, by thy bier, in mournful throngs
The women chant thy mortal wrongs,
5 'Twill be their own funereal songs,
Carolina !
From thy dead breast by ruffians trod
No helpless child shall look to God ;
All shall be safe beneath thy sod,
Carolina !
VII.
Girt with such wills to do and bear,
Assured in right and mailed in prayer,
Thou wilt not bow thee to despair, '
Carolina !
50 Throw thy bold banner to the breeze!
Front with thy ranks the threatening seas
Like thine own proud armorial trees,
Carolina !
^ Fling down thy gauntlet to the Huns,
65 And roar the challenge from thy guns;
Then leave the future to thy sons,
Carolina !
THE COTTON BOLL.*
While I recline
At ease beneath
170 This immemorial pine,
Small sphere !
(By dusky fingers brought this morning here
And shown with boastful smiles),
148 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
I turn thy cloven sheath,
175 Through which the soft white fibers peer,
That, with their gossamer bands,
Unite, like love, the sea-divided lands,
And slowly, thread by thread,
Draw forth the folded strands,
180 Than which the trembling line,
By whose frail help yon startled spider fled
Down the tall spear grass from his swinging bed,
Is scarce more fine;
And as the tangled skein
185 Unravels in my hands,
Betwixt me and the noonday light,
A veil seems lifted, and for miles and miles
The landscape broadens on my sight,
As, in the little boll, there lurked a spell
190 Like that which, in the ocean shell,
With mystic sound,
Breaks down the narrow walls that hem us round,
And turns some city lane
Into the restless main,
195 With all his capes and isles!
Yonder bird,
Which floats, as if at rest,
In those blue tracts above the thunder, where
No vapors cloud the stainless air,
200 And never sound is heard,
Unless at such rare time
When, from the City of the Blest,
Rings down some golden chime,
Sees not from his high place
205 So vast a cirque* of summer space
As widens round me in one mighty field,
Which, rimmed by seas and sands,
Doth hail its earliest daylight in the beams
Of gray Atlantic dawns;
210 And, broad as realms made up of many lands,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 149
Is lost afar
Behind the crimson hills and purple lawns
Of sunset, among plains which roll their streams
Against the Evening Star !
215 And lo!
To the remotest point of sight,
Although I gaze upon no waste of snow,
The endless field is white ;
And the whole landscape glows,
220 For many a shining league away,
With such accumulated light
As Polar lands would flash beneath a tropic day !
Nor lack there ( for the vision grows,
And the small charm within my hands —
225 More potent even than the fabled one,
Which oped whatever golden mystery
Lay hid in fairy wood or magic vale,
The curious ointment of the Arabian talc-
Beyond all mortal sense
230 Doth stretch my sight's horizon, and I see,
Beneath its simple influence,
As if with Uriel's crown,*
I stood in some great temple of the Sun,
And looked, as Uriel, down!)
235 Nor lack there pastures rich and fields all green
With all the common gifts of God,
For temperate airs and torrid sheen
Weave Edens of the sod ;
Through lands which look one sea of billowy gold
240 Broad rivers wind their devious way ;
A hundred isles in their embraces fold
A hundred luminous bays ;
And through yon purple haze
Vast mountains lift their plumed peaks cloud-
crowned ;
245 And, save where up their sides the plowman creeps,
An unhewn forest girds them grandly round,
In whose dark shades a future navy sleeps !
150 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Ye stars, which, though unseen, yet with me gaze
Upon this loveliest fragment of the earth !
250 Thou Sun, that kindlest all thy gentlest rays
Above it, as to light a favorite hearth !
Ye Clouds, that in your temples in the west
See nothing brighter than its humblest flowers !
And you, ye Winds,, that on the ocean's breast
255 Are kissed to coolness ere ye reach its bowers!
Bear witness with me in my song of praise,
And tell the world that, since the world began,
No fairer land hath fired a poet's lays,
Or given a home to man !
260 But these are charms already widely blown!
His be the meed whose pencil's trace
Hath touched onr very swamps with grace,
And round whose tuneful way
All Southern laurels bloom ;
265 The Poet of "The Woodlands/'* unto whom
Alike are known
The flute's low breathing and the trumpet's tone,
And the soft west wind's sighs ;
But who shall utter all the debt,
270 O land wherein all powers are met
That bind a people's heart,
The world doth owe thee at this day,
And which it never can repay,
Yet scarcely deigns to own !
275 Where sleeps the poet who shall fitly sing
The source wherefrom doth spring
That mighty commerce which, confined
To the mean channels of no selfish mart,
Goes out to every shore
280 Of this broad earth, and throngs the sea with ships
That bear no thunders ; hushes hungry lips
In alien lands ;
Joins with a delicate web remotest strands ;
And gladdening rich and poor,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 1
285 Doth gild Parisian domes,
Or feed the cottage smoke of English homes,
And only bounds its blessings by mankind ?
In offices like these thy mission lies,
My Country! and it shall not end
290 As long as rain shall fall and Heaven bend
In blue above thee. Though thy foes be hard
And cruel as their weapons, it shall guard
Thy hearthstones as a bulwark ; make thee great
In white and bloodless state ;
285 And haply, as the years increase —
Still working through its humbler reach
With that large wisdom which the ages teach —
Revive the half-dead dream of universal peace!
As men who labor in that mine
300 Of Cornwall,* hollowed out beneath the bed
Of ocean, when a storm rolls overhead,
Hear the dull booming of the world of brine
Above them, and a mighty muffled roar
Of winds and waters, yet toil calmly on,
305 And split the rock, and pile the massive ore,
Or carve a niche or shape the arched roof;
So I, as calmly, weave my woof
Of song, chanting the days to come,
Unsilenced, though the quiet summer air
310 Stirs with the bruit of battles, and each dawn
Wakes from its starry silence to the hum
Of many gathering armies. Still,
In that we sometimes hear,
Upon the Northern winds, the voice of woe
315 Not wholly drowned in triumph, though I know
The end must crown us, and a few brief years
Dry all our tears,
I may not sing too gladly. To thy will
Resigned, O Lord ! we cannot all forget
320 That there is much even Victory must regret.
And, therefore, not too long
From the great burthen of our country's wrong
152 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Delay our just release!
And, if it may be, save
325 These sacred fields of peace
From stain of patriot or of hostile blood!
O, help us, Lord ! to roll the crimson flood
Back on its course, and while our banners wing
Northward, strike with us ! till the Goth* shall cling
330 To his own blasted altar stones, and crave
Mercy; and we shall grant it, and dictate
The lenient future of his fate
There, where some rotting ships and crumbling
quays
Shall one day mark the Port which ruled the West
ern seas.*
PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE.
(1830-1886.)
The merit of Paul Hamilton Hayne was recognized
during his own life to an extent seldom known to
Southern writers of that day. He counted among his
friends and admirers such men as Simms, Timrod,
Poe, Longfellow, Whittier, Bayard Taylor, and Swin
burne. Yet his was a life of privation and suffering.
He was born at Charleston, South Carolina, of a fam
ily noted for its political and social influence. He was
educated at Charleston College and took the Southern
poet's usual course in law. He early became one of
the editors of The Southern Literary Gazette, pub
lished at Charleston, and later editor of Russell's
Magazine, published at the same place. At this time
his life was happy. He married a woman of wonder-
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 153
ful character; his fortune was ample, and he enjoyed
his work.
When the war began, he joined the staff of Govern
or Pickens; but ill health forced him to resign. His
home and valuable library were destroyed in the bom
bardment of Charleston; the family silver and other
treasures were swept away during Sherman's march
to the sea ; and when the war ended, he was an invalid,
almost penniless, and with a family to support. He
removed to Copse Hill, near Augusta, Georgia, and
spent the remainder of his life in a little cottage there.
His faithful wife, who had been reared in luxury, did
the family cooking and washing. Amidst such en
vironments he did the greater part of his best work.
From this silent, isolated place he sent forth such
works as Legends and Lyrics (1872), his introduction
to Timrod's poems. The Mountain of the Lovers and
Other Poems (1875), Life of Robert Y. Hayne
(1878), Life of Hugh S. Legarc (1878), the Complete
Edition of 1882, and many essays and poems never
collected.
Verse was to Hayne almost entirely a matter of
emotions, and he touched upon a great variety of senti
ments. He had fancy, smoothness, simplicity, and a
deep love of Nature and of the beautiful in general.
In spite of the amount of sentiment there is an ever-
present note of manliness and encouragement. Ham
ilton Mabie has said of him : ''He touched the two
themes which lay deepest in his heart — love of Nature
and love of the personal ideals of the Old South —
with perfect sincerity, with deep tenderness, and with
lyric sweetness."
154 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
LYRIC OF AcTioN.1 *
Tis the part of a coward to brood
O'er the past that is withered and dead:
What though the heart's roses are ashes and dust?
What though the heart's music be fled ?
5 Still shine the grand heavens o'erhead,
Whence the voice of an angel thrills clear on the
soul,
"Gird about thee thine armor, press on to the goal !"
If the faults or the crimes of thy youth
Are a burden too heavy to bear,
10 What hope can rebloom on the desolate waste
Of a jealous and craven despair?
Down, down with the fetters of fear !
In the strength of thy valor and manhood arise,
With the faith that illumes and the will that defies.
15 "Too late!" through God's infinite world,
From his throne to life's nethermost fires,
"Too late!" is a phantom that flies at the dawn
Of the soul that repents and aspires.
If pure thou hast made thy desires,
20 There's no height the strong wings of immortals
may gain
Which in striving to reach thou slialt strive for in
vain.
Then, up to the contest with fate,
Unbound by the past, which is dead !
What though the heart's roses are ashes and dust?
'These selections are used with the permission of Mr. Wil
liam IT. Hayne and the publishers, Lothrop, Lee & Shepard
Co.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 155
What though the heart's music be fled ?
Still shine the fair heavens o'erhead ;
And sublime as the seraph who rules in the sun*
Beams the promise of joy when the conflict is won!
AETHRA.
It is a sweet tradition, with a soul
30 Of tenderest pathos ! Hearken, love ! — for all
The sacred undercurrents of the heart
Thrill to its cordial music:
Once a chief,
Philantus, king of Sparta, left the stern
35 And bleak defiles of his unfruitful land —
Girt by a band of eager colonists —
To seek new homes on far Italian plains.*
Apollo's oracle* had darkly spoken:
"Where'er from cloudless skies a plenteous shower
40 Outpours, the Fates decree that ye should pause
And rear your household deities!"
Racked by doubt,
Philantus traversed with his faithful band
Full many a bounteous realm ; but still defeat
45 Darkened his banners, and the strong-walled towns
His desperate sieges grimly laughed to scorn !
Weighed down by anxious thoughts, one sultry eve
The warrior — his rude helmet cast aside —
Rested his weary head upon the lap
50 Of his fair wife, who loved him tenderly ;
And there he drank a generous draught of sleep.
She, gazing on his brow, all worn with toil,
And his dark locks, which pain had silvered over
With glistening touches of a frosty rime,
55 Wept on the sudden bitterly; her tears
Fell o>n his face, and, wondering, he woke.
"O blest art thou, my Ae'thra,* my clear sky"
He cried exultant, "from whose pitying blue
*5 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
A heart-rain falls to fertilize my fate !
60 Lo ! the deep riddle's solved — the gods spake truth !"
So the next night he stormed Tarentum,* took
The enemy's host at vantage, and o'erthrew
His mightiest captains. Thence with kindly sway
He ruled those pleasant regions he had won ;
65 But dearer even than his rich demesnes
The love of her whose gentle tears unlocked
The close-shut mystery of the Oracle !
MY STUDY.*
This is my world ! within these narrow walls,
I own a princely service. The hot care
70 And tumult of our frenzied life are here
But as a ghost and echo; what befalls
In the far mart to me is less than naught ;
I walk the fields of quiet Arcadies,*
And wander by the brink of hoary seas,
75 Calmed to the tendance of untroubled thought;
Or if a livelier humor should enhance
The slow-time pulse, 'tis not for present strife.
The sordid zeal with which our age is rife,
Its mammon conflicts crowned by fraud or chance,
80 But gleamings of the lost, heroic life,
Flashed through the gorgeous vistas of romance.
THE MOCKING BIRD.*
(At Night.)
A golden pallor of voluptuous light
Filled the warm southern night :
The moon, clear-orbed, above the sylvan scene
Moved like a stately queen,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 157
So rife with conscious beauty all the while,
What could she do but smile
At her own perfect loveliness below,
Glassed in the tranquil flow
90 Of crystal fountains and unruffled streams?
Half lost in waking dreams,
As down the loneliest forest dell I strayed,
Lo ! from a neighboring glade,
Flashed through the drifts of moonshine, swiftly
came
95 A fairly shape of flame.
It rose in dazzling spirals overhead,*
Whence to wild sweetness wed,
Poured marvelous melodies, silvery trill on trill ;
The very leaves grew still
100 On the charmed trees to hearken; while for me,
Heart-thrilled to ecstasy,
I followed — followed the bright shape that flew,
Still circling up the blue,
Till as a fountain that has reached its height
105 Falls back in sprays of light
Slowly dissolved, so that enrapturing lay
Divinely melts away
Through tremulous spaces to a music mist,
Soon by the fitful breeze
110 How gently kissed
Into remote and tender silences.
THE PINE'S MYSTERY.*
I.
Listen ! the somber foliage of the Pine,
A swart Gitana* of the woodland trees,
Is answering what we may but half divine
To those soft whispers of the twilight breeze !
158 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
II.
Passion and mystery murmur through the leaves,
Passion and mystery, touched by deathless pain.
Whose monotone* of long, low anguish grieves
For something lost that shall not live again !
OCTOBER.
120 The passionate summer's dead! the sky's aglow
With roseate flushes of matured desire,
The winds at eve are musical and low.
As sweeping chords of a lamenting lyre.
Far up among the pillared clouds of fire,
125 Whose pomp of strange procession upward rolls,
With gorgeous blazonry of pictured scrolls,
To celebrate the summer's past renown ;
Ah, me ! how regally the heavens look down,
O'ershadowing beautiful autumnal woods
130 And harvest fields with hoarded increase brown,
And deep-toned majesty of golden floods,
That raise their solemn dirges to the sky,
To swell the purple pomp that floateth by.
JAMES RYDER RANDALL.
(1839-1908.)
With the exception of Dixie, perhaps the most popu
lar song in the Confederate camps was Maryland, My
Maryland. Its author, James Ryder Randall, of Balti
more, was a professor (1861) in Poydras College,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 159
Pointe Coupee, Louisiana, and it was while at this
place that he arose one night from a wild dream and
wrote the words. Soon afterwards Mrs. Burton Har
rison set the poem to an old college melody, Lauriger
Horatius. In Randall we have another instance of a
man made famous by one song.
MY MARYLAND.
The despot's heel is on thy shore,
Maryland !
His torch is at thy temple door,
Maryland !
' Avenge the patriotic gore*
That flecked the streets of Baltimore,
And be the battle queen of yore,
Maryland, my Maryland!
Hark to an exiled son's appeal,
Maryland !
My Mother State, to thee I kneel,
Maryland !
For life and death, for woe and weal,
Thy peerless chivalry reveal,
And gird thy beauteous limbs with steel,
Maryland, my Maryland!
Thou wilt not cower in the dust,
Maryland !
Thy beaming sword shall never rust,
Maryland !
Remember Carroll's* sacred trust,
Remember Howard's* warlike thrust,
And all thy slumberers with the just,
Maryland, my Maryland!
l6o THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
a5 Come ! 'tis the red dawn of the day,
Maryland !
Come with thy 'panoplied array,
Maryland !
With Ringgold's* spirit for the fray,
30 With Watson's* blood at Monterey,
With fearless Lowe* and dashing May,*
Maryland, my Maryland!
Dear Mother ! burst the tyrant's chain,
Maryland !
35 Virginia should not call in vain,
Maryland !
She meets her sisters on the plain —
"Sic semper!"* 'tis the proud refrain
That baffles minions back amain,
40 Maryland !
Arise in majesty again,
Maryland, my Maryland!
Come ! for thy shield is bright and strong,
Maryland !
45 Come ! for thy dalliance does thee wrong,
Maryland !
Come to thine own heroic throng
Walking with Liberty along,
And chant thy dauntless slogan-song,
BO Maryland, my Maryland!
I see the blush upon thy cheek,
Maryland !
For thou wast ever bravely meek,
Maryland !
B5 But lo! there surges forth a shriek,
From hill to hill, from creek to creek,
Potomac calls to Chesapeake,
Maryland, my Maryland!
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. l6l
Thou wilt not yield the Vandal* toll
Maryland !
Thou wilt not crook to his control,
Maryland !
Better the fire upon thee roll,
Better the shot, the blade, the bowl,
C5 Than crucifixion of the soul,
Maryland, my Maryland!
I hear the distant thunder hum,
Maryland !
The Old Line bugle, fife, and drum,
Maryland !
She is not dead, nor deaf, nor dumb ;
Huzza ! she spurns the Northern scum !*
She breathes — she burns ! she'll come ! she'll
come !
Maryland, my Maryland!
ABRAM JOSEPH RYAN.
(1839-1886.)
Father Ryan has been one of the most widely read
poets in America. His poems, like those of Long
fellow, create a love for poetry. He was born at Nor
folk, Virginia, but early removed to St. Louis. He
was educated there and prepared for the priesthood
at Niagara., New York. After serving through the
war as a Confederate chaplain, he had charge of
churches in various cities, among them Nashville and
Knoxville, Tennessee ; Augusta, Georgia ; and Mobile,
Alabama ; and in all of these places he became known
ii
l62 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
and beloved because of his energetic support of good
causes, his genial disposition, and his interest in young
men. At length, his health having failed, he went for
rest to tb.^ monastery near Louisville, Kentucky, and
there he died. The most characteristic trait of his
verse is its unaffected sadness. He was not a master
of the technical phases of poetry; but his work is
always melodious and unlabored. If none of his
other poems were known, The Conquered Banner
would keep his memory green for generations.
THE CONQUERED BANNER.1 *
Furl that Banner, for 'tis weary;
Round its staff 'tis drooping dreary ;
Furl it, fold it, it is best;
For there's not a man to wave it,
5 And there's not a sword to save it,
And there's not one left to lave it
In the blood which heroes gave it ;
And its foes now scorn and brave it ;
Furl it, hide it — let it rest !
10 Take that Banner down! 'tis tattered;
Broken is its staff and shattered;
And the valiant hosts are scattered
Over whom it floated high.
O ! 'tis hard for us to fold it !
15 Hard to think there's none to hold it ;
Hard that those who once unrolled it
Now must furl it with a sigh.
Selected from Father Ryan's Poems. Copyright, P. J.
Kennedy & Sons, New York.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 163
Furl that Banner ! furl it sadly !
Once ten thousands hailed it gladly,
0 And ten thousands wildly, madly,
Swore it should forever wave *
Swore that foeman's sword should never
Hearts like theirs entwined dissever,
TilHhat flag should float forever
O'er their freedom or their grave !
Furl it ! for the hands that grasped it,
And the hearts that fondly clasped it,
Cold and dead are lying'low ;
And that Banner — it is trailing!
} While around it sounds the wailing
Of its people in their woe.
For, though conquered, they adore it !
Love the cold, dead hands that bore it !
Weep for those who fell before it !
Pardon those who trailed and tore it !
But, O ! wildly they deplore it,
Now who furl and fold it so.
Furl that Banner! True, 'tis gory,
Yet 'tis wreathed around with glory,
0 And 'twill live in song and story,
^ Though its folds are in the dust !
For its fame on brightest pages,
Penned by poets and by sages,
Shall go sounding down the ages —
Furl its folds though now we must.
Furl that Banner, softly, slowly !
Treat it gently— it is holy—
For it droops above the dead.
Touch it not— unfold it never,
Let it droop there, furled forever,
For its people's hopes are fled !
45
164 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
NIGHT THOUGHTS.*
Some reckon their age by years,
Some measure their life by art ;
But some tell their days by the flow of their tears,
55 And their life, by the moans of their heart.
The dials of earth may show
The length,— not the depth of years ;
Few or many they come, few or many they go,
But our time is best measured by tears.
60 Ah ! not by the silver gray
That creeps through the sunny hair,
And not by the scenes that we pass on our way,
And not by the furrows the fingers of care,
On forehead and face have made :
65 Not so do we count our year ;
Not by the sun of the earth, but the shade
Of our souls, and the fall of our tears.
For the young are ofttimes old,
Though their brow be bright and fair ;
70 While their blood beats warm,, their heart lies cold-
O'er them the springtime, but winter is there.
And the old are ofttimes young,
When their hair is thin and white ;
And they sing in age, as in youth they sung,
75 And they laugh, for their cross was light.
But bead by bead I tell
The rosary of my years ;
From a cross to a cross they lead,— 'tis well !
And they're blest with a blessing of tears.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 165
80
Better a day of strife*
Than a century of sleep ;
Give me instead of a long stream of life
The tempests and tears of the deep.
A thousand joys may foam
85 On the billows of all the years ;
But never the foam brings the lone heart home —
It reaches the haven through tears.
THE SWORD OF ROBERT LEE.*
Forth from its scabbard, pure and bright,
Flashed the sword of Lee !
80 Far in the front of the deadly fight,
High o'er the brave in the cause of Right,
Its stainless sheen, like a beacon light,
Led us to victory.
Out of its scabbard, where full long
95 It slumbered peacefully,
Roused from its rest by the battle's song,,
Shielding the feeble, smiting the strong,
Guarding the right, avenging the wrong,
Gleamed the sword of Lee.
100 Forth from its scabbard, high in air
Beneath Virginia's sky —
And they who saw it gleaming there,
And knew who bore it, knelt to swear
That where that sword led they would dare
To follow— and to die.
Out of its scabbard ! Never hand
Waved sword from stain as free ;
Nor purer sword led braver band,
1 66 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Nor braver bled for a brighter land,
110 Nor brighter land had a cause so grand,
Nor cause a chief like Lee !
Forth from its scabbard ! How we prayed
That sword might victor be !
And when our triumph was delayed,
115 And many a heart grew sore afraid,
We still hoped on while gleamed the blade
Of noble Robert Lee.
Forth from its scabbard all in vain
Bright flashed the sword of Lee ;
120 Tis shrouded now in its sheath again,
It sleeps the sleep of our noble slain,
Defeated, yet without a stain,
Proudly and peacefully.
SONG OF THE MYSTIC.*
I walk down the Valley of Silence—
125 Down the dim, voiceless valley — alone!
And I hear not the fall of a footstep
Around me, save God's and my own ;
And the hush of my heart is as holy
As hovers where angels have flown !
130 Long ago was I weary of voices
Whose music my heart could not win ;
Long ago was I weary of noises
That' fretted my soul with their din;
Long ago was I weary of places
105 Where I met but the human — and sin.
I walked in the world with the worldly ;
I craved what the world never gave ;
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 167
And I said : "In the world each Ideal
That shines like a star on life's wave
140 Is wrecked on the shores of the Real,
And sleeps like a dream in a grave."
And still did I pine for the Perfect,
And still found the False with the True ;
I sought 'mid the Human for Heaven,
145 But caught a mere glimpse of its Blue :
And I toiled on, heart-tired of the Human,
Veiled even that glimpse from my view.
And I toiled on, heart-tired of the Human,
And I moaned 'mid the mazes of men,
150 Till I knelt, long ago, at an altar,
And I heard a voice call me. Since then
I walked down the Valley of Silence
That lies far beyond mortal ken.
Do you ask what I found in the Valley ?
155 Tis my Trysting Place with the Divine.
And I fell at the feet of the Holy,
And above me a voice said : "Be Mine."
And there arose from the depths of my spirit
An echo : "My heart shall be thine."
leo Do you ask how I live in the Valley?
I weep — and I dream — and I pray.
But my tears are as sweet as the dewdrops
That fall on the roses in May;
And my prayer, like a perfume from censers,
165 Ascendeth to God night and day.
In the hush of the Valley of Silence
I dream all the songs that I sing;
And the music floats down the dim Valley,
Till each finds a word for a wing,
l68 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
170 That to hearts, like the dove of the deluge,
A message of peace they may bring.
But far on the deep there are billows '
That never shall break on the beach ;
And I have heard songs in the Silence
That never shall float into speech ;
And I have had dreams in the Valley
Too lofty for language to reach.
And I have seen Thoughts in the Valley—*'
Ah me ! how my spirit was stirred !
80 And they wear holy veils on their faces,
Their footsteps can scarcely be heard :
They pass through the Valley like virgins, '
Too pure for the touch of a word !
Do you ask me the place of the Valley,
Ye hearts that are harrowed by care ?
It lieth afar between mountains,
And God and His angels are there:
And one is the dark mount of Sorrow,
And one the bright mountain of Prayer.
V.
THE NEW SOUTH.
(1875-1907.)
GENERAL SURVEY.
Rightly indeed have the modern conditions of the
Southern States been placed within the conception:
"The New South." A vast change has taken place
since 1865. Henry Grady has expressed it well: "The
old South rested everything on slavery and agriculture,
unconscious that these could neither give nor maintain
healthy growth. The new South presents a perfect
democracy, the oligarchs leading in the popular move
ment — a social system compact and closely knitted,
less splendid on the surface, but stronger at the core —
a hundred farms for every plantation, fifty houses for
every palace, and a diversified industry that meets the
complex needs of this complex age."
The talk of an "oppressed South" has now become
an unavailing weapon, even in the hands of the un
scrupulous politician, and in its place has come a reali
zation of the wonderful resources, advantages, and un
doubted future greatness of the section. This has
given an impetus to such an industrial development as
can scarcely be paralleled in any other portion of the
world. The cotton, iron, lumber, and sugar alone of
the South seem destined to make it a veritable treasure
land.
With all this there has come a genuine revival in
literary work. Judge Tourgee has said : "A foreigner
studying our current literature without knowledge of
(170
17* THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN TOETRY.
our history, and judging our civilization by our fiction,
would undoubtedly conclude that the South was the
seat of intellectual empire in America." Poetry has
not kept pace with fiction ; but among the leading verse
writers of to-day no small number are from the South.
SIDNEY LANIER.
(1842-1881.)
In Sidney Lanier we find a true genius. Year by
year students of literature are coming nearer and
nearer to the realization of the fact that in this man
America had a most original, deep, and melodious
poet — one capable of bearing comparison with the
greater lights of the world's literature. He was born
at Macon, Georgia, and at the age of fifteen entered
Oglethorpe College, near Milledgeville, Georgia, an
institution which was unworthy of the name "college."
After graduating he was appointed instructor in this
school, but had served only a few months when he
joined the Confederate army. He saw much hard
service, and during the last months of the war was a
prisoner at Point Lookout.
The privations suffered in this place were so great
that it was over a year before he was able to work. In
1867 he took charge of a school at Prattville, Alabama,
married Miss Mary Day, of Macon, Georgia, and con
tinued the literary work which he had begun during
war days. In 1868 the hardships of the great strife
again began to show their effect, and he had to give
up his school and return to Macon. Seeing that life
was from this time forth to be but a struggle with
death, he determined to risk all for the sake of literary
work. He had inherited astonishing musical ability,
and was at this time probably the best flute player in
174 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
America. Consequently in 1873 he secured the posi
tion of first flute in the Peabody Symphony Orchestra
of Baltimore, and in that city the busiest years of his
career were spent. He became a lecturer in Johns
Hopkins University, taught private classes, played sev
eral nights in each week, and wrote constantly. By
1880 the battle for life was an hourly struggle. He
wrote his greatest poem, Sunrise, at a time when he
was too weak to feed himself and while his fever was
at one hundred and four. In 1881 he was taken to the
mountains of North Carolina, first near Asheville and
later at Lynn, where on September 7 the struggle was
ended.
Among Lanier's works may be mentioned Tiger
Lilies, a novel; his volume of lectures, entitled The
English Novel; Music and Poetry; and his valuable
Science of English Verse. Of his poems, the greatest
perhaps are Corn, The Hymns of the Marshes, The
Song of the Chattahoochee, and Sunrise. Lanier had
a theory that time and not accent is the basis of poetic
rhythm. Every line of verse thus divides itself into
measures equivalent to those in music. For instance,
he would divide these lines of Tennyson's into portions
of two units each:
r
9
r
r
Break,
Break,
Break,
9 0
) H
0
c r
i r
On thy cold
gray stones,
O sea!
By this system he obtained symphonic effects rarely
equaled in the poetry of any nation. The dignity,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 175
emotionalism, and sweeping, majestic movement of his
lines lift the thought above earth and compel notice
by the mode of its utterance. Here indeed is what
Hamilton Wright Mabie has called "the large ele
mental movement of imagination, ... a movement
which has a touch of tidal depth and reach in it, a hint
of cosmical power and meaning."
A BALLAD OF TREES AND THE MASTER.1*
Into the woods my Master went,
Clean forspent, forspent,
Into the woods my Master came,
Forspent with love and shame.
5 But the olives they were not blind to Him,
The little gray leaves were kind to Him :
The thorn tree had a mind to Him
When into the woods He came.
Out of the woods my Master went,
10 And He was well content.
Out of the woods my Master came,
Content with death and shame.
When Death and Shame would woo Him last,
From under the trees they drew Him last:
'Twas on a tree they slew Him last,
When out of the woods He came.
THE MARSHES OF
Glooms of the live-oaks, beautiful-braided and
woven
With intricate shades of the vines that myriad-
cloven
'These poems are used with the permission of Mary D.
Lanier and the publishers, Charles Scribner's Sons.
176 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Clamber the forks of the multiform boughs —
20 Emerald twilights,
Virginal shy lights.
Wrought of the leaves to allure to the whisper of
vows,
When lovers pace timidly down through the green
colonnades
Of the dim sweet woods, of the dear dark woods,*
25 Of the heavenly woods and glades,
That run to the radiant marginal sand beach within
The wide sea marshes of Glynn ; —
Beautiful glooms, soft dusks in the noonday fire,
Wildwood privacies, closets of lone desire,
30 Chamber from chamber parted with wavering arras*
of leaves — •
Cells for the passionate pleasure of prayer* to the
soul that grieves,
Pure with a sense of the passing of saints through
the wood,
Cool for the dutiful weighing of ill with good ; —
O braided dusks of the oak and woven shades of
the vine,
85 While the riotous noonday sun of the June day long
did shine
Ye held me fast in your heart and I held you fast
in mine ;
But now when the noon is no more, and riot is rest,
And the sun is a-wait at the ponderous gate of the
West,
And the slant yellow beam down the wood-aisle
doth seem
40 Like a lane into heaven that leads from a dream —
Ay, now, when my soul all day hath drunken the
soul of the oak,*
And my heart is at ease from men, and the weari
some sound of the stroke
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 177
Of the scythe of time and the trowel of trade is
low.,
And belief overmasters doubt, and I know that I
know,
45 And my spirit is grown to a lordly great compass
within,
That the length and the breadth and the sweep of
the marshes of Glynn
Will work me no fear like the fear they have
wrought me of yore
When length was fatigue, and when breadth was
but bitterness sore,
And when terror and shrinking and dreary un-
namable pain
0 Drew over me out of the merciless miles of the
plain —
O, now unfraid, I am fain to face
The vast sweet visage of space.
To the edge of the wood I am drawn, I am drawn,
Where the gray beach glimmering runs, as a belt of
the dawn,
For a mete and a mark
To the forest dark —
So:
Affable live-oak, leaning low,
Thus— with your favor— soft, with a reverent hand,
9 (Not lightly touching your person, Lord of the
land!)
Bending your beauty aside, with a step I stand
On the firm-packed sand,
Free
By a world of marsh that borders a world of sea.
5 Sinuous southward and sinuous northward the
shimmering band
Of the sand beach fastens the fringe of the marsh to
the folds of the land.
12
178 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Inward and outward to northward and southward
the beach-lines linger and curl
As a silver-wrought garment that clings to and fol
lows the firm sweet limbs of a girl.
Vanishing, swerving, evermore curving again into
sight,
70 Softly the sand beach wavers away to a aim gray
looping of light.
And what if behind me to westward the wall of the
woods stands high ?
The world lies east : how ample, the marsh and the
sea and the sky!
A league and a league of marsh grass, waist-high,
broad in the blade,
Green, and all of a height, and unflecked with a
light or a shade,
75 Stretch leisurely off, in a pleasant plain,
To the terminal blue of the main.
O, what is abroad in the marsh and the terminal
sea?
Somehow my soul seems suddenly free
From the weighing of fate and the sad discussion
of sin,
80 By the length and the breadth and the sweep of the
marshes of Glynn.
Ye marshes, how candid and simple and nothing
withholding and free
Ye publish yourselves to the sky and offer your
selves to the sea !
Tolerant plains, that suffer the sea and the ram
and the sun,
Ye spread and span like the catholic* man who hath
mightily won
85 God out of knowledge and good out of infinite pain
And sight out of blindness and purity out
stain.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 179
As the marsh hen secretly builds on the waterv
sod,*
Behold I will build me a nest on the greatness of
God:
I will fly in the greatness of God as the marsh hen
flies
0 In the freedom that fills all the space 'twixt the
marsh and the skies :
By so many roots as the marsh grass sends in the
sod
I will heartily lay me a-hold on the greatness of
God:
O, like to the greatness of God is the greatness
within
The range of the marshes, the liberal marshes of
Glynn.
05 And the sea lends large, as the marsh : lo, out of his
plenty the sea
Pours fast : full soon the time of the floodtide must
be:
Look how the grace of the sea doth go
About and about through the intricate channels
that flow
ioo Here and there,
Everywhere,
Till his waters have flooded the uttermost creeks
and the low-lying lanes,
And the marsh is meshed with a million veins,
That like as with rosy and silvery essences flow
In the rose-and-silver evening glow.
Farewell, my lord Sun !*
The creeks overflow: a thousand rivulets run
Twixt the roots of the sod ; the blades of the marsh
grass stir;
Passeth a hurrying sound of wings that westward
whir ;
l8o THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Passeth, and all is still; and the currents cease to
run;
110 And the sea and the marsh are one.
How still the plains of the waters be !
The tide is in his ecstasy.
The tide is at his highest height :
"'And now from8thf Vast of the Lord will the waters
of sleep
Roll in on the souls of men.
But who will reveal to our waking ken
The forms that swim and the shapes that creep
Under the waters of sleep?
120 And I would I could know what swimmeth below
when the tide comes in
On the length and the breadth of the marvelous
marshes of Glynn.
SONG OF THE CHATTAHOOCHEE."
Out of the hills of Habersham,*
Down the valleys of Hall,*
T hurry amain to reach the plain,
125 Run the rapid and leap the fall.
Split at the rock and together again,
Accept my bed, or narrow or wide,
And flee from folly on every side
With a lover's pain to attain the plant
130 Far from the hills of Habersham,
Far from the valleys of Hall.
All clown the hills of Habersham,
All through the valleys of Hall,
The rushes cried, Abide, abide*
125 The willful waterweeds held me thrall.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 181
The laving laurels turned my tide,
The ferns and the fondling grass said, Stay,
The dewberry dipped for to work delay,
And the little reeds sighed, Abide , abide,
140 Here in the hills of Habersham,
Here in the valleys of Hall.
High o'er the hills of Habersham,
Veiling the valleys of Hall,
The hickory told me manifold
145 pajr tajes 0£ shade, the poplar tall
Wrought me her shadowy self to hold,
The chestnut, the oak, the walnut, the pine,
Overleaning, with flickering meaning and sign,
Said, Pass not, so cold, these manifold
150 Deep shades of the hills of Habersham,
These glades in the valleys of Hail.
And oft in the hills of Habersham,
And oft in the valleys of Hall,
The white quartz shone, and the smooth brook-
stone
155 Did bar me of passage with friendly brawl,
And many a luminous jewel lone
— Crystals clear or a-cloud with mist,
Ruby, garnet, and amethyst —
Made lures with the lights of streaming stone
160 In the clefts of the hills of Habersham,
In the beds of the valleys of Hall.
But O, not the hills of Habersham,
And O, not the valleys of Hall
Avail : I am fain for to water the plain.
165 Downward the voices of Duty call —
Downward, to toil and be mixed with the main,
The dry fields burn, and the mills are to turn,
l82 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
And a myriad flowers mortally yearn,
And the lordly main from beyond the plain
170 Calls o'er the hills of Habersham,
Calls through the valleys of Hall.
JOHN HENRY BONER.
(1845-1903.)
John Henry Boner was born at Salem, North Caro
lina. He edited papers at Salem and at Asheville,
and, entering politics, became chief clerk of the North
Carolina House of Representatives. In 1887 he re
moved to New York City and took up literary work.
Much of his work has a distinctly Southern flavor.
POE'S COTTAGE AT FORDHAM.*
Here lived the soul enchanted
By melody of song;
Here dwelt the spirit haunted
By a demoniac throng;
5 Here sang the lips elated;
Here grief and death were sated ;
Here loved and here unmated
Was he, so frail, so strong.
Here wintry winds and cheerless*
10 The dying firelight blew,
While he whose song was peerless
Dreamed the drear midnight through,
And from dull embers chilling
Crept shadows darkly filling
15 The silent place, and thrilling
His fancy as they grew.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 183
Here, with brow bared to heaven,
In starry night he stood,
With the lost star of seven*
20 Feeling sad brotherhood.
Here in the sobbing showers
Of dark autumnal hours
He heard suspected powers*
Shriek through the stormy wood.
25 From visions of Apollo*
And of Astarte's* bliss,
He gazed into the hollow
And hopeless vale of Dis;*
And though earth were surrounded
30 By heaven, it still was mounded
With graves. His soul had sounded
The dolorous abyss.
Proud, mad, but not defiant,*
He touched at heaven and hell.
85 Fate found a rare soul pliant
And rung her changes well.
Alternately his lyre,
Stranded with strings of fire,
Led earth's most happy choir
40 Or flashed with IsrafeL*
No singer of old story
Luting accustomed lays,
No harper for new glory,
No mendicant for praise,
He struck high chords and splendid.
Wherein were fiercely blended
Tones that unfinished ended
With his unfinished days.
184 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Here through this lowly portal,
50 Made sacred by his name,
Unheralded immortal
The mortal went and came.
And fate that then denied him,
And envy that decried him,
55 And malice that belied him,*
Have cenotaphed his fame.
THE LIGHT'OOD FiRE.1 *
When wintry days are dark and drear
And all the forest ways grow still.
When gray snow-laden clouds appear
Along the bleak horizon hill,
When cattle all are snugly penned
And sheep go huddling close together,
When steady streams of smoke ascend
From farmhouse chimneys — in such weather
Give me old Carolina's own,
A great log house, a great hearthstone,
A cheering pipe of cob or brier,
And a red, leaping light'ood fire.
When dreary day draws to a close
70 And all the silent land is dark,
When Boreas* down the chimney blows
And sparks fly from the crackling bark,
When limbs are bent with snow or sleet
And owls hoot from the hollow tree,
75 With hounds asleep about your feet,
Then is the time for reverie.
'From Whispering Pines, published by Brentano's, New
York.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 185
Give me old Carolina's own,
A hospitable wide hearthstone,
A cheering pipe of cob or brier,
J And a red, rousing light'ood fire.
JOHN BANISTER TABB.
0
John Banister Tabb was born in Amelia County,
Virginia. He served in the Confederate army, and
was a prisoner with Sidney Lanier at Point Lookout.
He became a Catholic priest in 1884, and soon after
wards was made professor of English literature in
St. Charles College, Maryland. His lyrics have re
ceived wide notice.
THE HALF-RING MooN.1
Over the sea, over the sea,
My love he is gone to a far countrie ;
But he brake a golden ring with me
The pledge of his faith to be.
5 Over the sea, over the sea,,
He comes no more from the far countrie;
But at night, where the new moon loved to be,
Hangs the half of a ring for me.
'These selections are from Poems by John B. Tabb. By
permission of the author and the publishers, Small, Maynard
& Co.
1 86 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
MY STAR.
Since the dewdrop holds the star
10 The long night through,
Perchance the satellite afar
Reflects the dew.
And while thine image in my heart
Doth steadfast shine,
15 There, haply, in thy heaven apart
Thou keepesi mine.
GEORGE HERBERT SASS.
(1845-1908.)
Born at Charleston, South Carolina, George Herbert
Sass was educated at the College of Charleston, where
he graduated in 1867. He early began to contribute
verse to the periodicals,, under the name "Barton
Grey;" but his poems were not collected until 1904.
Doubtless the best-known lines in this volume, The
Heart's Quest — A Book of Verses, are those entitled
In a King-Cambyscs Vein.
IN A KING-CAMBYSES VEIN.1
Cambyses, King of the Persians,
Sat with his lords at play
iprom The Heart's Quest — A Book of Verses. By Barton
Grey. Copyright, 1904, by George Herbert Sass. Used by
permission of the author.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 187
Where the shades of the broad plane-branches
Slanted athwart the way.
5 And he listened and heard Prexaspes
Tell to his fellows there
Of a Bactrian bowman's prowess
And skill beyond compare.
And the heart of the King was bitter,
10 And he turned and said to him :
"Dost see on the greensward yonder
That plane-tree's slender limb?
"It stands far off in the gloaming —
Dost think thy Bactrian could
r> With a single shaft unerring
Smite through that slender wood ?"
"But nay/' then said Prexaspes,
"Nor ever a mortal man
Since the days when Nimrod hunted
Where great Euphrates ran."
Then Cambyses, son of Cyrus,
Looked, and before him there
Meres, the King's cupbearer,
Stood where the wine flowed clear.
25 Meres, the King's cupbearer,
Prexaspes' only son,
And the heart of the King was hardened,
And the will of the King was done.
And he said : "Bind Meres yonder
To the plane-tree's slender stem,
And give me yon sheaf of arrows
And the bow that lies by them."
1 88 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
And so, when the guards had bound him,
He drew the shaft to the head;
85 "Give heed! give heed, Prexaspes,
I aim for the heart !" he said.
Sharp through the twilight stillness
Echoed the steel bow's twang;
Loud through the twilight stillness
The courtiers' plaudits rang.
And the head of the boy drooped downward,
And the quivering shaft stood still;
And the King said : "O, Prexaspes,
Match I thy Bactrian's skill ?"
45 Then low before Cambyses
The Satrap bowed his head —
"O, great King, live forever !
Thou hast cleft the heart !" he said.
CARLYLE M' KIN LEY.
(1847-1904.)
Carlyle McKinley was born at Newnan, Georgia,
and was educated at the University of Georgia. After
serving in the Confederate army until the close of
the Civil War, he entered the Southern Presbyterian
Theological Seminary at Columbia, South Carolina,
where he graduated in 1874. During the next year
he became a member of the staff of the Charleston
News and Courier, with which paper he was connected
at the time of his death. Selections from the Poems of
Carlyle McKinley was published in 1904.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 189
SAPELO.1 *
Far from thy shores, enchanted isle,
To-night I claim a brief surcease
From toil and pain, to dream awhile
Of thy still peace —
6 To wander on thy shining strand,
And lose awhile life's troubled flow;
Its tumults die upon thy sand,
Blest Sapelo.
The sun is setting in the west ;
10 The last light fades on land and sea ;
The silence woos all things to rest —
And wooeth me.
So here I lie, with half-closed eye,
Careless, without one vexing thought,
15 While cool uncounted hours drift by
In dreamy sort.
And ever, sweet thoughts without words,
The shadows of old memories,
Rise up and float away, as birds
20 Float down the skies.
In dreams I see the live-oak groves ;
In dreams I hear the curlews cry,
Or watch the little mourning doves
Speed softly by.
25 I hear the surf beat on the sands,
And murmurous voices from the sea ;
1From Selections from the Poems of Carlyle McKinley,
1904.
190 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
The wanton waves toss their white hands,
And beckon me.*
The waves are murmuring on the beach,
5 A soft wind whispers in the palm ;
There is no sound of ruder speech
To mar the calm.
The happy sun comes up once more
Above the woods I know so well;
The rosy heaven from shore to shore
Glows like a shell.
I see the great old trees and tall,
Sheeted with tangled vines that sweep
From limb to limb — a leafy pall,
40 Where shadows sleep.
The long moss waves in every breeze,
Like tattered banners, old and gray;
And sigh and sigh the old, old trees
All night, all day.
5 With flower and fruit at once arrayed,
The orange groves are passing fair,
As though all seasons loved such shade
And lingered there.*
The turning tide runs slowly out ;
T hear the marsh birds calling shrill ;
The toiling oarsmen's song and shout
Come to me still.
I hear their boat songs through the night ;
I think it is my heart that hears
66 The old songs sounding yet, despite
These long, long years.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 191
White clouds are drifting out to sea-,
Like clouds the great ships come and go,
As strange, and white, and silently,
10 As soft and slow.
From far-off lands, like tired things,
They wander hither o'er the deep.
Here all things rest, they fold their wings
And fall asleep.*
WILL HENRY THOMPSON.
(1848- .)
Will Henry Thompson was born at Calhoun, Geor
gia, and while yet a boy entered the Confederate army
and served until the close of the Civil War. In 1868
he removed to Crawfordsville, Indiana, and entered
into a law partnership with his brother, the well-
known writer, Maurice Thompson. He removed to
Seattle, Washington, in 1889. He is distinguished as
an orator, and has shown considerable ability in his
vigorous and often vivid verse.
THE HIGH TIDE AT GETTYSBURG.1 *
A cloud possessed the hollow field,
The gathering battle's smoky shield.
Athwart the gloom the lightning flashed,
And through the cloud some horsemen dashed?
5 And from the heights the thunder pealed.
*By permission of the Century Company, Publishers.
192 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Then at the brief command of Lee*
Moved out that matchless infantry.
With Pickett* leading grandly down,
To rush against the roaring crown
10 Of those dread knights of destiny.
Far heard above the angry guns
A cry across the tumult runs —
The voice that rang through Shiloh's* woods
And Chickamauga's* solitudes,
15 The fierce South cheering on her sons !
Ah, how the withering tempest blew
Against the front of Pettigrew!*
A Khansin wind that scorched and singed
Like that infernal flame that fringed
20 The British squares at Waterloo !*
A thousand fell where Kemper* led,
A thousand died where Garnett* bled :
In blinding flame and strangling smoke
The remnant through the batteries broke
25 And crossed the works with Armistead.
"Once more in Glory's van with me !"
Virginia cried to Tennessee;
"We two together, come what may,
Shall stand upon these works to-day !"
30 (The reddest day in history.)
Brave Tennessee! In reckless way
Virginia heard her comrade say :
"Close round this rent and riddled rag!"
What time she set her battle flag
85 Amid the guns of Doubleday.*
But who shall break the guards that wait
Before the awful face of Fate?
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 193
The tattered standards of the South
Were shriveled at the cannon's mouth,
40 And all her hopes were desolate.
In vain the Tennesseean set
His breast against the bayonet !
In vain Virginia charged and raged,
A tigress in her wrath uncaged,
45 Till all the hill was red and wet !
Above the bayonets mixed and crossed,
Men saw a gray, gigantic ghost
Receding through the battle cloud,
And heard across the tempest loud
50 The death cry of a nation lost !
The brave went down ! Without disgrace
They leaped to Ruin's red embrace.
They only heard Fame's thunders wake
And saw the dazzling sunburst break
55 In smiles on Glory's bloody face!
They fell, who lifted up a hand
And bade the sun in heaven to stand !
They smote and fell, who set the bars
Against the progress of the stars,
60 And stayed the march of Motherland!
They stood, who saw the future come
On through the fight's delirium !
They smote and stood, who held the hope
Of nations on that slippery slope
65 Amid the cheers of Christendom.
God lives ! He forged the iron will
That clutched and held that trembling hill.
God lives and reigns ! He built and lent
The heights for Freedom's battlement
70 Where floats her flag in triumph still !
13
194 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Fold up the banners ! Smelt the guns !
Love rules ! Her gentler purpose runs.
A mighty mother turns in tears
The pages of her battle years,*
75 Lamenting all her fallen sons !
ROBERT BURNS WILSON.
(1850- .)
Robert Burns Wilson was born in Washington
County, Pennsylvania, but early removed to Frankfort,
Kentucky. There he became an artist. His pictures
have attracted considerable attention and praise. His
verse contributed to the various American magazines
is smooth and musical.
DEDICATION.1
The green Virginian hills were blithe in May,
And we were plucking violets — thou and I.
A transient gladness flooded earth and sky ;
Thy fading strength seemed to return that day,
5 And I was mad with hope that God would stay
Death's pale approach — O ! all hath long passed by !
Long years ! long years ! and now, I well know why
Thine eyes, quick rilled with tears, were turned
away.
First loved ; first lost ; my mother : time must still
'These selections are from Life and Love. Cassell Pub
lishing Company. By permission of the author.
150
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 195
Leave my soul's debt uncanceled. All that's best
In me and in my art is thine : Me-seems
Even now we walk a-field. Through good and
ill
My sorrowing heart forgets not, and in dreams
I see thee in the sun-lands of the blest.
THE DEATH OF WINTER.
Pierced by the sun's bright arrows, Winter lies
With dabbled robes upon the blurred hillside ;
Fast runs the clear cold blood, in vain he tries
With cooling breath to check the flowing tide.
He faintly hears the footsteps of fair Spring
Advancing through the woodland to the dell ;
Anon she stops to hear the waters sing,
And call the flowers, that know her voice full
well.
Ah now she smiles to see the glancing stream;
bhe stirs the dead leaves with her anxious feet;
She stoops to plant the first awakening beam,
And woos the cold Earth with warm breathings
sweet.
"Ah, gentle mistress, doth thy soul rejoice
To find me thus laid low ? So fair thou art !
Let me but hear the music of thy voice ;
Let me but die upon thy pitying heart. '
Soon endeth life for me. Thou wilt be blessed •
ihe flowering fields, the budding trees be thine
Grant me the pillow of thy fragrant breast ;
Then come, oblivion, I no more repine."
196 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
35 Thus urged the dying Winter. She, the fair,
Whose heart hath love, and only love, to give.
Did quickly lay her full warm bosom bare ^ ^
For his cold cheek, and fondly whispered Live.
His cold white lips close to her heart she pressed;
*° Her sighs were mingled with each breath he drew ;
And when the strong life faded, on her breast
Her own soft tears fell down like heavenly dew.
O ve sweet blossoms of the whispering lea, _
Ye fair, frail children of the woodland wide,
45 Ye are the fruit of that dear love which she
Did give to wounded Winter ere he died.
And some are tinted like her eyes of blue,
Some hold the blush that on her cheek did glow,
Some from her lips have caught their scarlet hue,
™ But more still keep the whiteness of the snow.
1RWIN RUSSELL.
(1853-1879.)
During his brief life Irwin Russell produced some
striking work along the line of negro dialect verse.
In fact, he was one of the first to realize the literary
value of the negro character and dialect. He was
born at Port Gibson, Mississippi, but early in his child
hood his family removed to St. Louis, and there in
the public schools and in St. Louis University he re
ceived his education. He studied law, but did not
practice it. His work appeared first in Scribner's Mag-
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 197
azine for January, 1876, and was well received. In
December, 1878, he went to New York to engage in
literary work, but severe illness compelled him to
return South. He went to New Orleans, suffered great
privations, and died there in December, 1879. He
seemed to know the very soul of the old-time negro,
and few have equaled him in such delineations. Such
writers as Joel Chandler Harris and Thomas Nelson
Page have gratefully acknowledged their indebtedness
to him.
CHRISTMAS NIGHT IN THE QUARTERS.1 *
When merry Christmas day is done,
And Christmas night is just begun ;
While clouds in slow procession drift,
To wish the moon-man "Christmas gift,"
5 Yet linger overhead, to know
What causes all the stir below —
At Uncle Johnny Booker's ball
The darkies hold high carnival.
From all the countryside they throng,
10 With laughter, shouts, and scraps of song —
Their whole deportment plainly showing
That to the Frolic they are going.
Some take the path with shoes in hand,
To traverse muddy bottom land;
15 Aristocrats their steeds bestride —
Four on a mule, behold them ride !
And ten great oxen draw apace
The wagon from "de oder place,"
With forty guests, whose conversation
20 Betokens glad anticipation.
*By permission of the Century Company, Publishers.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Not so with him who drives : old Jim
Is sagely solemn, hard, and grim,
And frolics have no joys for him.
He seldom speaks but to condemn — •
25 Or utter some wise apothegm—
Or else, some crabbed thought pursuing,
Talk to his team, as now he's doing:
Come up heah, Star ! Yee-bawee !
You alluz is a-laggin' —
0 Mus' be you think Fse dead,
An' dis de huss you's draggin' —
You's 'mos' too lazy to draw yo' bref,
Let 'lone drawin' de waggin.
Dis team — quit bel'rin, sah !
35 De ladies don't submit 'at—
Dis team — you ol' fool ox,
You heah me tell you quit 'at ?
Dis team's dcs like de 'Nited States !
Dot's what I'se tryin' to git at !
40 De people rides behin',
De pollytishners haulin' —
Sh'u'd be a well-bruk ox,
To foller dat ar callin' —
An' sometimes nuffin won't do clem steers
4r> But what dey mus' be stallin' !
Woo bahgh ! Buck-kannon !* Yes, sah,
Sometimes dey will be stickin';
An' den, fits thing dey knows,
Dey takes a rale good lickin'.
0 De folks gits down : an' den watch out
Fur hommerin* an' kickin'.
Dey blows upon dey hands,
Den flings 'em wid de nails up,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 199
Jumps up an' cracks dey heels,
55 An' pruzently dey sails up,
An' makes dem oxen hump deysef,
By twistin' all dey tails up !
In this our age of printer's ink
'Tis books that show us how to think* —
' The rule reversed, and set at naught,
That held that books were born of thought.
We form our minds by pedants' rules,
And all we know is from the schools ;
And when we work, or when we play,
65 We do it in an ordered way —
And Nature's self pronounce a ban on,
Whene'er she dares transgress a canon.
Untrammeled thus the simple race is
That "wuks the craps" on cotton places.
70 Original in act and thought,
Because unlearned and untaught.
Observe them at their Christmas party :
How unrestrained their mirth — how hearty !
How many things they say and do
1 That never would occur to you !
See B rudder Brown — whose saving grace
Would sanctify a quarter-race —
Out on the crowded floor advance,
To "beg a blessin' on dis dance :"
so O Mahsr! let dis gath'rin' fin' a' blessin' in yo'
sight !
Don't jedge us hard fur what we does — you knows*
it's Chrismus night;
An' all de balunce ob de yeah we does as right's we
kin.
Ef dancin's wrong, O Mahsr ! let de time excuse de
sin!
200 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
We labors in de vineya'd, wukin' hard an' wukin"
true ;
85 Now, shorely you won't notus, ef we eats a grape
or two,
An* takes a leetle holiday — a leetle restin' spell —
Bekase, nex' week, we'll start in fresh, an' labor
twicet as well.
Remember, Mahsr— min' dis, now— de sinfulness
ob sin
Is 'pendin' 'pon de sperrit what we goes an' does it
in:
90 An' in a righchis frame ob min' we's gwine to dance
an' sing,
A-feelin' like King David, when he cut de pigeon
wing.*
It seems to me — indeed it do — I mebbe mout be
wrong —
That people raly ought to dance, when Chrismus
comes along';
Des dance bekase dey's happy — like de birds hops
in de trees,
95 De pine-top riddle soundin' to de bowin' ob de
breeze.
We has no ark to dance afore, like Isrul's prophet
king;
We has no harp to soun' de chords, to holp us out
to sing;
But 'cordin' to de gif's we has we does de bes' we
knows ;
An' folks don't 'spise de vi'let flower bekase it ain't
de rose.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 2OI
100 You bless us, please, sah, eben ef we's doin' wrong
to-night ;
Kase den we'll need de blessin' more'n ef we's doin'
right ;*
An' let de blessin' stay wid us, untel we comes to
die,
An' goes to keep our Chrismus wid dem sheriffs* in
de sky!
Yes, tell dem preshis anguls we's a-gwine to jine
'em soon :
105 Our voices we's a-trainin' fur to sing de glory tune;
We's ready when you wants us, an' it ain't no mat
ter when —
O Mahsr ! call yo' chillen soon, an' take 'em home !
Amen.
The rev'rend man is scarcely through,
When all the noise begins anew,
110 And with such force assaults the ears,
That through the din one hardly hears
Old fiddling Josey "sound his A,"*
Correct the pitch, begin to play,
Stop, satisfied, then, with the bow,
115 Rap out the signal dancers know:
Git yo' pardners, fust kivattillwn!
Stomp yo' feet, an' raise 'em high;
Tune is: O! dat watermillion !
Gwine to git to home bime bye."
120 S'htte yo' pardners! — scrape perlitely —
Don't be bumpin' gin de res' —
Balance all! — now, step out rightly;
Alluz dance yo' lebbel bes'.
Fo'wa'd foah! — whoop up, niggers!
12(5 Back ag'in! — don't be so slow! —
Suing cornahs! — min' de figgers!
When I hollers, den yo' go.
202 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Top ladies cross ober!
Hoi' on, till I takes a dram —
Gemmen solo! — yes, I's sober —
Cain't say how de fiddle am.
Hands around! — hoi' up yo' faces,
Don't be lookin' at yo' feet!
Sluing yo' pardncrs to yo' places!
135 DatYde way— dat's hard to beat.
Sides fo'itfd! — when you's ready —
Make a bow as low's you kin !
Swing acrost wid opp'sitc lady!
Now we'll let you swap ag'in :
140 Ladies change! — shet up dat talkin';
Do yo' talkin' arter while !
Right an' lef ! — don't want no walkin' —
Make yo' steps, an' show yo' style !
And so the "set" proceeds — its length
145 Determined by the dancers' strength ;
And all agree to yield the palm
For grace and skill to "Georgy Sam/'*
Who stamps so hard, and leaps so high,
"Des watch him !" is the wond'ring cry —
ir,o «jje nigger mus' be, fur a fac'.
Own cousin to a jumpin'-jack !"
On, on the restless riddle sounds,
Still chorused by the curs and hounds ;
Dance after dance succeeding fast,
155 Till supper is announced at last.
That scene — but why attempt to show it ?
The most inventive modern poet,
In fine new words whose hope and trust is,
Could form no phrase to do it justice!
leo "When supper ends — that is not soon —
The fiddle strikes the same old tune;
The dancers pound the floor again,
With all they have of might and main ;
Old gossips, almost turning pale,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 203
105 Attend Aunt Cassy's gruesome tale
Of conjurers, and ghosts, and devils,
That in the smokehouse hold their revels;
Each drowsy baby droops his head,
Yet scorns the very thought of bed:
So wears the night, and wears so fast,
All wonder when they find it past,
And hear the signal sound to go
From what few cocks are left to crow.
Then, one and all, you hear them shout :
"Hi! Booker! fotch de banjo out,
An' gib us one song 'fore we goes —
One ob de berry bes' you knows!"
Responding to the welcome call,
He takes the banjo from the wall,
And tunes the strings with skill and care,
Then strikes them with a master's air,
And tells, in melody and rhyme,
This legend of the olden time :
Go 'way, fiddle! folks is tired o' hearin' you
a-squawkin'.
185 Keep silence fur yo' betters !— don't you hear de
banjo talkin' ?
About de 'possum's tail she's gwine to lecter — ladies,
listen ! —
About de ha'r whut isn't dar, an' why de ha'r is
missin' :
"Dar's gwine to be a oberflow," said Noah, lookin'
solemn —
Fur Noah tuk the Herald* an' he read de ribber
column —
90 An' so he sot his hands to wuk a-cl'arin' timber
patches,
An' 'lowed he's gwine to build a boat to beat the
steamah Natchez.*
204 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Ol' Noah kep' a-nailin' an' a-chippin' an' a-sawin',
An' all de wicked neighbors kep' a-laughin' an'
a-pshawin' ;
But Noah didn't min' 'em, knowin' whut wuz gwine
to happen :
195 An' forty days an' forty nights de rain it kep'
a-drappin'.
Now, Noah had done cotched a lot ob ebry sort o'
beas'es —
Ob all de shows a-trabbelin', it beat 'em all to
pieces !
He had a Morgan* colt an' sebral head o' Jarsey
cattle —
An' druv 'em 'board de Ark as soon's he heered de
thunder rattle.
200 Den sech anoder fall ob rain! — it come so awful
hebby,
De ribber riz imimejitly, an' busted troo de lebbee ;
De people all wuz drowned out — 'cep' Noah an' de
critters.
An' men he'd hired to work de boat — an' one to
mix de bitters.*
De ark she kep' a-sailin' an' a-sailin' an' a-sail-
in' ; _
205 De lion got his dander up, an' like to bruk de paliri' ;
De sarpints hissed ; de painters yelled ; tell, whut
wid all de fussin',
You c'u'dn't hardly heah de mate a-bossin' 'roun'
an' cussin'.
Now, Ham, de only nigger whut wuz runnin' on
de packet,
Got lonesome in de barber shop, an' c'u'dn't stan'
de racket;
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 205
210 An' so, fur to amuse he-se'f, he steamed some wood
an' bent it,
An' soon he had a banjo made — de fust dat wuz
invented.
He wet de ledder, stretched it on ; made bridge an'
screws an' aprin ;
An' fitted in a proper neck — 'twtiz berry long an'
tap'rin' ;
He tuk some tin, an' twisted him a thimble fur to
ring it ;
215 An' den de mighty question riz: how wuz he gwine
to string it?
De 'possum had as fine a tail as dis dat Fs a-sing-
in';
De ha'r's so long an' thick an' strong — des fit fur
banjo-stringin' ;
Dat nigger shaved 'em off as short as wash-day-
dinner graces;
An' sorted ob 'em by de size, f'om little E's to
basses.
220 He strung her, tuned her, struck a jig — 'twuz
"Nebber min' de wedder" —
She soun' like forty-lebben bands a-playin' all to-
gedder ;
Some went to pattin', some to dancin' : Noah called
de figgers ;
An' Ham he sot an' knocked de tune, de happiest
ob niggers !
Now, sence dat time— it's mighty strange — dere s
not de slightes' showin'
225 Ob any ha'r at all upon de 'possum's tail a-grow-
in';
206 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
An' curl's, too, dat nigger's ways : his people nebber
los' em —
Fur whar you finds de nigger — dar's de banjo an'
de 'possum!
The night is spent; and as the day
Throws up the first faint flash of gray,
230 The guests pursue their homeward way ;
And through the field beyond the gin,
Just as the stars are going in,
See vSanta Claus departing — grieving —
His own dear Land of Cotton leaving.
285 His work is done ; he fain would rest
Where people know and love him best.
He pauses, listens, looks about ;
But go he must : his pass is out.
So, coughing down the rising tears,
240 He climbs the fence* and disappears.
And thus observes a colored youth
(The common sentiment, in sooth) :
"O ! what a blessin' 'tw'u'd ha' been,
Ef Santy had been born a twin !
245 We'd hab two Chrismuses a yeah —
Or p'r'aps one brudder'd settle heah!"
SAMUEL MINTURN PECK.
(1854- 0
Samuel Minturn Peck was born near Tuscaloosa,
Alabama, and was educated at the State University.
After a medical course in New York City, he re
turned to his native town and has lived there since.
He is a writer of very graceful verse, and some of
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
his pieces, / Wonder What Maud Will Say, A Knot
of Blue, and Bessie Brown, M.D., have been exceed
ingly popular.
BESSIE BROWN, M.D.1
'Twas April when she came to town ;
The birds had come, the bees were swarming.
Her name, she said, was Doctor Brown:
^ I saw at once that she was charming.
5 She took a cottage tinted green,
Where dewy roses loved to mingle ;
And on the door next day was seen
A dainty little shingle.
Her hair was like an amber wreath;
Her hat was darker, to enhance it.
The violet eyes that glowed beneath
Were brighter than her keenest lancet.
The beauties of her glove and gown
^ The sweetest rhyme would fail to utter,
5 Ere she had been a day in town
The town was in a flutter.
The gallants viewed her feet and hands,
And swore they never saw such wee things ;
The gossips met in purring bands
0 And tore her piecemeal o'er the tea things.
The former drank the Doctor's health
With clinking cups, the gay carousers ;
The latter watched her door by stealth,
Just like so many mousers.
> But Doctor Bessie went her way
Unmindful of the spiteful cronies,
'The poems given are used by permission of the author and
Frederick A. Stokes Company, Publishers.
208 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
And drove her buggy every day
Behind a dashing pair of ponies.
Her flower-like face so bright she bore,
30 I hoped that time might never wilt her.
The way she tripped across the floor
Was better than a philter.
Her patients thronged the village street;
Her snowy slate was always quite full.
35 Some said her bitters tasted sweet,
And some pronounced her pills delightful.
'Twas strange — I knew not what it meant —
She seemed a nymph from Eldorado;
Where'er she came, where'er she went,
40 Grief lost its gloomy shadow.
Like all the rest, I too grew ill ;
My aching heart there was no quelling.
I tremble at my doctor's bill —
And lo ! the items still are swelling.
45 The drugs I've drunk you'd weep to hear!
They've quite enriched the fair concocter,
And. I'm a ruined man, I fear,
Unless — I wed the Doctor !
THE CAPTAIN'S FEATHER.
The dew is on the heather,
50 The moon is in the sky,
And the captain's waving feather
Proclaims the hour is nigh
When some upon their horses
Shall through the battle ride,
55 And some with bleeding corses
Must on the heather bide.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 209
The dust is on the heather.
The moon is in the sky,
And about the captain's feather
60 The bolts of battle fly ;
But hark, what sudden wonder
Breaks forth upon the gloom ?
It is the cannon's thunder —
It is the voice of doom !
65 The blood is on the heather,
The night is in the sky,
And the gallant captain's feather
Shall wave no more on high ;
The grave and holy brother
70 To God is saying mass,
But who shall tell his mother,
And who shall tell his lass?
THE GRAPEVINE SWING.
When I was a boy on the old plantation,
Down by the deep bayou,
The fairest spot of all creation,
Under the arching blue;
When the wind came over the cotton and corn,
To the long slim loop I'd spring
With brown feet bare, and a hat brim torn,
And swing in the grapevine swing.
Swinging in the grapevine swing,
Laughing where the wild birds sing,
I dream and sigh
For the days gone by,
Swinging in the grapevine swing!
Out — o'er the water lilies bonnie and bright,
Back — to the moss-grown tree;
14
210 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
I shouted and laughed with a heart as bright
As a wild rose tossed by the breeze.
90 The mocking bird joined in my reckless glee,
I longed for no angel's wing—
I was just as near heaven as I wanted to be
Swinging in the grapevine swing.
Swinging in the grapevine swing,
95 Laughing where the wild birds sing,
O to be a boy
With a heart full of joy,
Swinging in the grapevine swing !
100
105
I'm weary at noon, I'm weary at night,
I'm fretted and sore at heart.
And care is sowing my locks with white
As I wend through the fevered mart.
I'm tired of the world, with its pride and pomp,
And fame seems a worthless thing.
I'd barter it all for one day's romp,
And a swing in the grapevine swing.
Swinging in the grapevine swing^
Laughing where the wild birds sing,
I would I were away
From the world to-day,
Swinging in the grapevine swing !
PHYLLIS.
The singing of sweet Phyllis
Like the silver laughing rill is,
And her breath is like the lily's
115 In the dawn.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 211
As graceful as the dipping
Summer swallow or the skipping
Of a lambkin is her tripping
O'er the lawn.
To whom shall I compare her?
To a dryad ? No. She's rarer.
She is something — only fairer
Like Bo-peep.
She is merry, she is clever;
125 Surely had Bo-peep been ever
Half so winsome she had never
Lost a sheep.
Her eyes are like the heather,
Or the skies in April weather;
And as blue as both together
In the spring.
Alas ! I need a meter,
As I pipe her, that is sweeter,
And a rhythm that is fleeter
On the wing.
Beyond a poet's fancies.
Though the muse had kissed his glances,
Is her dimple when it dances
In a smile.
O the havoc it is making-
Days of sorrow, nights of waking-
Half a score of hearts are aching
All the while!
Sweet Phyllis ! I adore her,
And with beating heart implore her
On my loving knees before her
In alarm.
212 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Tis neither kind nor rightful
That a lassie so delightful
150 Should exert a spell so frightful
With her charm.
WILLIAM HAMILTON HAYNE.
(1856- .)
William Hamilton Hayne, son of Paul Hamilton
Hayne, was born at Charleston, South Carolina, but
early removed with his father to Copse Hill, near
Augusta, Georgia. His verse is seen frequently in
magazines of the day.
THE YULE LOG.
Out of the mighty Yule log came
The crooning of the little wood flame,
A single bar of music fraught
With cheerful yet half-pensive thought—
5 A thought elusive, out of reach,
Yet trembling on the verge of speech.
SLEEP AND His BROTHER DEATH.1
Just ere the darkness is withdrawn,
In seasons of cold or heat,
Close to the boundary line of Dawn
10 These mystical brothers meet.
'These selections are used with the permission of the author.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 213
They clasp their weird and shadowy hands,,
As they listen each to each;
But never a mortal understands
Their strange immortal speech.
FRANK LEBBY STAN TON.
(1857- 0
Frank L. Stanton was born at Charleston, South
Carolina ; and, after receiving a common-school educa
tion, learned the printer's trade. After serving on
various Georgia papers, he joined the staff of the
Atlanta Constitution, and through its columns has
gained a wide fame. Among his numerous volumes,
perhaps his best-known ones are Comes One with a
Song (1898), Songs from Dixie Land (1900), Up
from Georgia (1902), and Little Folks Down South
(1904). The sentiment, music, humbleness of theme,
and clearness of his verse have made it exceedingly
popular. He has been called the most prolific writer
of verse in the world.
COMES ONE WITH A SONG.*
In the strife and the tumult that sweeps us along
Conies one with a song.
In the storm of the nations— the wrath for the
wrong —
Comes one with a song.
'These selections are used with the permission of the author.
2.14 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
5 And over the rage of the people the skies
See the light of a lovelier morning arise;
There are prayers on Love's lips, and the light's in
Love's eyes :
Comes one with a song.
In the rude clamor and crush of the throng
10 Comes one with a song.
The winds have foretold him ; rills rippled along
Of one with a song.
And the sword's in the scabbard, and soft as the
clew
On the lips of the lilies — God's white thoughts of
you — •
15 Love's dear arms enfold you ; light breaks from the
blue !
Comes one with a song.
LIGHT ON THE HILLS.
Dying, they lifted his curly head,
And he looked to the east, and smiling said :
"It's light on the hills !"
20 And he went away, in the morning bright
With that last, sweet, quivering word of "Light"
On the lips Death kissed to a silence long. . .
So ends the sighing, and so ends the song.
And I think that Death, with his icy breath,
25 Was kind to him ; and I'm friend with Death
For that light on the hills !
Back of it — back of it glooms the Night,
Dark and lonely ; but all was light
When his lips were laid in the silence long. . .
30 So ends the sighing, and so ends the song.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 215
If I remember his brief, bright years
With the pang at the heart — with the falling of
tears.
There is light on the hills !
But he sleeps beneath, and the light's above,
35 And something is lost to the world in love.
And heaven knows this ; but it does no wrong. . . .
So ends the sighing, and so ends the song.
"There is light on the hills." So we sing, so we
say,
When God sends His angel to kiss it away —
There is light on the hills !
And we kneel in the darkness and say that we
trust.
When heaven's not as dear as our love in the
dust !— -
As the love that it reaps — that it keeps from us
long. . . .
So ends the sighing, and so ends the song.
HENRY JEROME STOCKARD.
(1858- .)
Henry J. Stockard was born in Cheatham County,
North Carolina, and was educated at the State Uni
versity. He has held various professorships in col
leges of North Carolina, and is now a professor in
Peace Institute, Raleigh. A volume of his verse,
Fugitive Lines, appeared in 1897.
2l6 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
HOMER.1
That conjuring name doth change the centuries,
And the enchanted pagan world restore !
Old Triton* and the Nereids* sport before
Poseidon's* chariot storming down the seas.
Pan* blows his mellow reed, and to the breeze
The nautilus unfurls his sail once more ;
While silver voices wake the waters o'er
'Mid asphodels on Anthemusia's leas.
I hear the Odyssey and Iliad rise
With deeper rhythm than that of Chios' surge,
And there upon the blue /Egean's verge,
Unchanging while the centuries increase,
After three thousand years before me lies
The unveiled shore of old sea-cinctured Greece !
YATES SNOW DEN.
(1858- .)
Yates Snowden was born at Charleston, South
Carolina, and was educated at the College of Charles
ton. After his graduation, in 1879, he studied law
and was admitted to the bar in 1882; but he has prac
ticed the profession but little. Mr. Snowden was for
some time on the staff of The News and Courier, of
Charleston; but in 1904 was appointed professor of
history in South Carolina College, now the University
of South Carolina, and has since been occupied with
this work.
'From Fugitive Lines. By permission of the author and
G. P. Putnam's Sons.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 217
A CAROLINA BouRBON.1
W. M. P. (1812-1902).
Ridiculous to some may seem
This relic of the old regime,
So rudely wakened from his dream
Of high ambition.
5 A heart of nature's noblest mold,
By honor tempered and controlled —
O look not in a soul so bold
For mock contrition.
For when the die of war was cast,
10 And through the land the bugle blast
Called all to arms from first to last,
For Carolina —
Careless of what might be his fate,
He gave his all to save the State ;
15 He thought, thinks now (strange to relate),
No cause diviner.
Of name and lineage proud, he bore
The character 'mongst rich and poor
Which marks now, as in days of yore,
The Huguenot.
Two hundred slaves were in his train,
Six thousand acres broad domain.
(His ancestors in fair Touraine
Had no such lot.)
25 He loved and wooed in early days ;
She died — and he her memory pays
The highest tribute — for, with ways
And views extreme,
'By permission of the author.
2l8 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
He, 'gainst stern facts and common sense,
80 To the whole sex (to all intents)
Transferred the love and reverence
Of life's young dream.
Perhaps too easy life he led —
Four hours afield and ten abed ;
35 His other time he talked and read,
Or else made merry
With many a planter friend to dine,
His health to drink in rare old wine —
Madeira, which thrice crossed the line,
40 And gold-leaf Sherry.
And here was mooted many a day
The question on which each gourmet
Throughout the Parish had his say:
"Which is the best,
45 Santee or Cooper River bream?"
Alas ! the evening star grew dim,
Ere any guest agreed with him,
Or he with guest.
The war rolled on; and many a friend
r>0 And kinsman, whom he helped to send
Their homes and country to defend,
Home ne'er returned.
What harder lot could now befall ?
Threats could not bend nor woes appall ;
C5 Unmoved, he saw his Fathers' hall
To ashes burned.
And now to live within his means,
He dons his gray Kentucky jeans.
(His dress, in other times and scenes,
60 Was drop d'ctc*)
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 219
His hat is much the worse for wear;
His shoes revamped from year to year,
For ''calfskin boots are all too dear/'
We hear him say.
65 So life drags on as in a trance,
No emigre of stricken France,
No Jacobite of old romance
Of sterner mold.
His fortune gone, his rights denied;
70 For him the Federal Union died
When o'er Virginia's line the tide
Of battle rolled.
Loyal je serai durant ma vie*
So runs his motto. What cares he
75 For the flag that flies from sea to sea
And tops the world?
Within the silence of his gates
Death's welcome shadow he awaits,
Still true to those Confederate States
80 Whose flag is furled.
DANSKE DANDRIDGE.
(i859- 0
Danske Dandridge was born at Copenhagen, Den
mark, her father being at the time United States min
ister to that country. In 1877 she married Stephen
Dandridge, of Shepherdstown, West Virginia. Her
first volume. Joy and Other Poems, appeared in 1888.
220 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
THE DEAD MooN.1
We are ghost-ridden:
Through the deep night
Wanders a spirit.
Noiseless and white.
5 Loiters not, lingers not, knoweth not rest ;
Ceaselessly haunting the East and the West.
She, whose undoing the ages have wrought,
Moves on to the time of God's rhythmical thought.
In the dark, swinging sea,
10 As she speedeth through space,
She reads her pale image;
The wounds are agape on her face.
She sees her grim nakedness
Pierced by the eyes
15 Of the Spirits of God
In their flight through the skies.
(Her wounds, they are many and hollow.)
The Earth turns and wheels as she flies.
And this Specter, this Ancient, must follow.
20 When, in the aeons,
Had she beginning?
What is her story?
What was her sinning?
Do the ranks of the Holy Ones
25 Know of her crime?
Does it loom in the mists
Of the birthplace of Time?
The stars, do they speak of her
Under their breath,
selections are used by permission of the author.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 221
so "Will this Wraith be forever
Thus restless in death?"
On,, through immensity,
Sliding and stealing,
On, through infinity,
36 Nothing revealing.
I see the fond lovers;
They walk in her light;
They charge the "soft maiden"
To bless their love-plight.
40 Does she laugh in her place,
As she glideth through space?
Does she laugh in her orbit with never a sound?
That to her, a dead body,
With nothing but rents in her round —
45 Blighted and marred,
Wrinkled and scarred,
Barren and cold,
Wizened and old —
That to her should be told,
50 That to her should be sung
The yearning and burning of them that are young?
Our Earth that is young,
That is throbbing with life,
Has fiery upheavals,
Has boisterous strife;
But she that is dead has no stir, breathes no air ;
She is calm, she is voiceless, in lonely despair.
We dart through the void ;
We have cries, we have laughter ;
The phantom that haunts us
Comes silently after.
This Ghost-lady follows.
Though none hear her tread;
222 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
On, on, we are flying,
65 Still tracked by our Dead—
By this white, awful Mystery,
Haggard and dead.
THE SPIRIT AND THE WOOD SPARROW.
'Twas long ago:
The place was very fair;
70 And from a cloud of snow
A spirit of the air
Dropped to the earth below.
It was a spot by man untrod;
Just where,
75 I think, is only known to God.
The spirit for a while,
Because of beauty freshly made,
Could only smile ;
Then grew the smiling to a song,
80 And as he sang he played
Upon a moonbeam-wired cithole
Shaped like a soul.
There was no ear
Or far or near,
85 Save one small sparrow of the wood?
That song to hear.
This, in a bosky tree,
Heard all, and understood
As much as a small sparrow could
By sympathy.
'Twas a fair sight
That morn of Spring
When on the lonely height
The spirit paused to sing,
' Then through the air took flight,
Still lilting on the wing.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 223
And the shy bird,
Who all had heard,
Straightway began
To practice o'er the lovely strain;
Again, again ;
Though indistinct and blurred,
He tried each word.
Until he caught the last far sounds that fell
105 Like the faint tinkles of a fairy bell.
Now when I hear that song,
Which has no earthly tone,
My soul is carried with the strain along
To the everlasting Throne :
110 To bow in thankfulness and prayer,
And gain fresh faith, and love, and patience there.
BENJAMIN SLEDD.
(1864- .)
Benjamin Sledd was born in Bedford County, Vir
ginia, and was educated at Washington and Lee and
at Johns Hopkins. He is now professor of English
in Wake Forest College, North Carolina. Among his
works are two volumes of poetry — From Cliff and
Scaur (1897) and The Watchers of the Hearth
(1901).
THE CHILDREN.1
No more of work ! Yet ere I seek my bed,
Noiseless into the children's room I go,
With its four little couches all a-row,
And bend a moment over each dear head.
lBy permission of the author and Richard J. Badger & Co.
224 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
5 Those soft, round arms upon the pillow spread,
Those dreaming lips babbling more than we
know,
One tearful, smothered sigh of baby woe —
Fond dream of chiding, would they were unsaid !
And while on each moist brow a kiss I lay,
10 With tremulous rapture grown almost to pain,
Close at my side I hear a whispered name :
Our long-lost babe, who with the dawning came,
And in the midnight went from us again.
And with bowed head, one good-night more I say.
MADISON CAW BIN.
(1865- .)
Madison Cawein was born at Louisville, Kentucky,
and was in business there for some years. He is a
most zealous writer and a poet of no small power.
Such volumes as Triumph of Music, Lyrics and
Idylls, Red Leaves and Roses, and The Vale of Tenipe
are of high excellence. He is capable of much vivac
ity and fancy, and yet there is oftentimes a tone of
deep earnestness in his work.
THE WmppooRwiLL.1
Above long woodland ways that led
To dells the stealthy twilights tread
The west was hot geranium-red;
And still, and still,
MJsed by permission of the author and publishers, G. P.
Putnam's Sons.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 225
5 Along old lanes, the locusts sow
With clustered curls the May times know,
Out of the crimson afterglow,
We heard the homeward cattle low,
And then the far-off, far-off woe
Of "whippoorwill !" of "whippoorwill !"
Beneath the idle beechen boughs
We heard the cow-bells of the cows
Come slowly jangling toward the house;
And still, and still,
15 Beyond the light that would not die
Out of the scarlet-haunted sky,
Beyond the evening star's white eye
Of glittering chalcedony,
Drained out of dusk the plaintive cry
Of "whippoorwill !" of "whippoorwill !"
What is there in the moon, that swims
A naked bosom o'er the limbs,,
That all the wood with magic dims?
While still, while still,
25 Among the trees whose shadows grope
'Mid ferns and flow'rs the dewdrops ope —
Lost in faint deeps of heliotrope
Above the clover-scented slope —
Retreats, despairing past all hope,
The whippoorwill, the whippoorwill.
DISENCHANTMENT OF DEATH.
Hush ! She is dead ! Tread gently as the light
Foots dim the weary room. Thou shalt behold.
Look : In death's ermine pomp of awful white,
Pale passion of pulseless slumber virgin cold:
5 Bold, beautiful youth proud as heroic Might —
Death ! and how death hath made it vastly old.
15
226 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Old earth she is now : energy of birth
Glad wings hath fledged and tried them sud
denly ;
The eyes that held have freed their narrow mirth;
40 Their sparks of spirit, which made this to be,
Shine fixed in rarer jewels not of earth,
Far Fairylands beyond some silent sea.
A sod is this whence what were once those eyes
Will grow blue wild-flowers in what happy air ;
45 Some weed with flossy blossoms will surprise,
Haply, what summer with her affluent hair ;
Blush-roses bask those cheeks ; and the wise skies
Will know her dryad to what young oak fair.
The chastity of death hath touched her so,
50 No dreams of life can reach her in such rest;
No dreams the mind exhausted here below,
Sleep built within the romance of her breast.
How she will sleep ! like music quickening slow
Dark the dead germs, to golden life caressed.
55 Low music, thin as winds that lyre the grass,
Smiting through red roots harpings; and the
sound
Of elfin revels when the wild dews glass
Globes of concentric beauty on the ground ;
For showery clouds o'er tepid nights that pass
60 The prayer in harebells and faint foxgloves
crowned.
So, if she's dead, thou know'st she is not dead.
Disturb her not; she lies so lost in sleep:
The too-contracted soul its shell hath fled:
Her presence drifts about us and the deep
65 Is yet unvoyaged and she smiles o'erhead :
Weep not nor sigh — thou wouldst not have her
weep ?*
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 227
To principles of passion and of pride,
^ To trophied circumstance and specious law,
Stale saws of life, with scorn now flung aside,
From Mercy's throne and Justice would'st thou
draw
Her, Hope in Hope, and Chastity's pale bride,
In holiest love of holy, without flaw?
The anguish of the living merciless —
Mad, bitter cruelty unto the grave —
75 Wrings the clear dead with tenfold heart's distress,
Earth chaining love, bound by the lips that rave.
If thou hast sorrow, let thy sorrow bless
That power of death, of death our selfless slave.
"Unjust?" He is not! for hast thou not all,
All that thou ever haclst* when this dull clay
So heartless, blasted now, flushed spiritual,
A restless vassal of Earth's night and day ?
This hath^ been thine and is; the cosmic call
Hath disenchanted that which might not stay.
85 Thou unjust !— bar not from its high estate-
Won with what toil through devastating cares,
What bootless battling with the violent Fate,
What mailed endeavor with resistless years—
That soul : whole-hearted granted once thy mate,
Heaven only loaned, return it not with tears.
LOVE AND A DAY.1
In girandoles of gladioles
The day had kindled flame;
And Heaven a door of gold and pearl
Unclosed when Morning — like a girl,
'Copyright, 1901, by Madison J. Cawein. From Weeds
by the Wall 1901.
228 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
95 A red rose twisted in a curl —
Down sapphire stairways came.
Said I to Love: "What must I do?
What shall I do? What can I do?"
Said I to Love: "What must I do?
100 All on a summer's morning."
Said Love to me: "Go woo, go woo."
Said Love to me : "Go woo.
If she be milking, follow, O!
And in the clover hollow, O !
io5While through the dew the bells clang clear,
Just whisper it into her ear, ^
All on a summer's morning."
LIZETTE WOODWORTH REESE.
(1856- .)
Lizette Woodworth Reese was born at Waverly,
Maryland, but has lived most of her life at Baltimore.
Her collected poems, A Branch of May, appeared in
1887, and received flattering notices.
IN SORROW'S HouR.1
The brambles* blow without you— at the door
They make late April— and the brier too
Buds its first rose for other folk than you ;
In the deep grass the elder bush once more
5 Heaps its sweet snow ; and the marsh-marigold
With its small fire sets all the sedge aflare ;
'By permission of Messrs. Morris & Hinkley, Baltimore,
administrators of Cushings & Bailey, Publishers.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 229
Like flakes of flame blown down the gray, still
air,
The cardinal flower is out in thickets old.
O, love ! O, love ! what road is yours to-day ?
For I would follow after, see your face,
Put my hand in your hand, feel the dear grace
Of hair, mouth, eyes, hear the brave words you say.
The dark is void, and all the daylight vain.
O that you were but here with me again !
WALTER MALONE.
(1866- .)
Judge Malone was born in De Soto County, Missis
sippi. After graduating at the University of Missis
sippi, in 1887, he went to Memphis, Tennessee, to
take up the practice of law, and has resided there
since, with the exception of three years (1897-1900)
spent in literary work in New York. Among his
numerous work are The Outcast and Other Poems
(1885), Songs of Dusk and Dazvn (1894), Songs of
North and South (1900), and Poems (1904).
A PORTRAIT OF HENRY TiMROD.1
Strange eyes gaze sadly from that weary face,
Beneath a brow that shows the seal of care ;
Defeat and Disappointment leave their trace
Upon the youthful visage pictured there.
'By permission of the author.
230 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
5 The same old story here is handed down —
The true-born poet and the same old doom —
The bard who starves while rhymesters wear the
crown,
Who finds his throne erected in a tomb.
Gone are the glories of your halcyon days.
10 Gone are the heroes whom you sung of yore ;
Their banners in the skies no longer blaze,
Their fervent shouts are stilled for evermore.
No more their white steeds paw the bloody field,
No more their trumpets rouse the raptured soul,
15 No more their ranks in fiery fight are wheeled,
No more their drums like sullen thunders roll.
Yet as I view your old-time picture, all
The proud past blossoms, though your day has
fled;
Once more I hear your Stuart's battle-call,
20 And see your Stonewall rising from the dead.
I see their blazoned banners float like fire,
I hear their shouts sweep down the perished
years ;
I hear once more the throbbing of your lyre,
Ecstatic with a nation's hopes and fears.
25 And foes with friends now come to honor you,
O poet, free from blemish and from blame ;
A wreath is yours as long as men are true,
As long as Courage wins the crown of Fame!
NOTES.
R. RICH, GENT.
These specimens from Newes from Virginia are given, not
because of any poetic merit, but simply to show the general
spirit of the times, the character of the first colonists, the
hardships that they suffered, and the hopes that were theirs.
Line 3: "Report doth lye." It was believed in both Great
Britain and America that Gates and Newport had been lost
at sea.
Line 24: "Wee hope." This line has something of the
character of a prophecy. It expresses an idea greater than
its writer realized.
JOHN SMITH.
"Advertisement." The word formerly had a meaning akin
to our word "advice" or "explanation."
GEORGE SANDYS.
OVID.— A Roman poet (43 B.C.-i8 A.D.), whose Meta
morphoses, a poem in fifteen books, tells the story of many
wonderful changes of human beings into animals, trees, etc.
GEORGE ALSOP.
PURPLE CAP. — Such a cap was sometimes placed upon the
dead.
Line 13: "Noll." A popular seventeenth-century abbre
viation of "Oliver."
232 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Line 14: "Westminster." Cromwell's head was exposed
in Westminster Hall, London.
Line 19: "Three-pile." A heavy, expensive velvet.
BACON'S EPITATH.
Line 2: "Spleen." A word formerly used for "anger" or
"jealousy."
Line 21 : "Mars." The Roman god of war, son of Jupiter
and Juno.
Line 21 : "Minerva." The goddess of arts and sciences,
said to have sprung from the head of Jupiter. The Par
thenon was her temple.
Line 22: "Whose pen and sword alike." Contemporary
accounts show Bacon to have been not only a brave leader,
but a man of brilliant intellect as well. Born at Suffolk,
England, in 1647, and educated in London, he came to Vir
ginia in 1673, quickly gained rank as a lawyer, and soon be
came a member of Sir William Berkeley's council. In 1675
the colonists chose him, against the wishes of Berkeley, as
leader of the forces sent to subdue the Indians, and in 1676
Berkeley declared him a rebel. Bacon entered Jamestown,
with his troops, and forced the governor to give him the
commission. A number of conflicts ensued; but Bacon, by
means of his shrewdness and versatility, always came forth
victor. He died, probably from the effects of poison, October
i, 1676.
Line 23: "Cato." A Roman patriot (234 B.C.-T49 B.C.),
noted as writer, orator, statesman, and soldier.
Line 35 : "Whether to Caesar." A reference to the accu
sation against Jesus, that he was Caesar's enemy.
EBENEZER COOK.
Line 9 : "A pious, conscientious rogue." The feeling was
then very bitter against the Quakers, and this line probably
struck a popular chord.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 233
Line n: "Swore." It is against the creed of the Quaker
to swear to a statement. He holds to the biblical command
to let the answer be simply "yea" or "nay."
Line 14: "Light within." The Quaker is guided by inner
light, or conscience, rather than by theological dogma.
Line 17: "Ten thousand weight." Very little money was
used in early American commerce. In the South tobacco
was the basis of valuation.
Line 19: "Oronooka." A fine brand of tobacco.
VIRGINIA HEARTS OF OAK.
Line 3: "Than America copies." This was literally true.
When hostilities first began, it was not the intention of the
American colonies to separate from England, and many
Americans opposed the idea until the very close of the war.
Line n: "Magna Charta." The English bill of rights
(1215) by which many privileges were gained by the common
people.
Notice the brave and hearty swing of this poem. The
form of expression agrees with the sentiment of the song.
HUGH HENRY BRACKENRIDGE.
WARREN.— An American statesman and general (1741-
1775), killed at the Battle of Bunker Hill. A statue of him
stands there to-day.
Line 10: "Brutus." This may very well be applied to
either Lucius Junius Brutus (500 B.C.) or Marcus Junius
Brutus (84 B.C.-42 B.C.). Lucius drove the king from Rome
and established a republic; Marcus endeavored to preserve its
freedom, and for that purpose became one of the assassins
of Julius Caesar.
Line 10: "Hampden." A British patriot (1594-1643), who
opposed the tyranny of Charles I. and fought in Cromwell's
army.
234 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Line 10: "Sidney." A British patriot (1622-1683), who
opposed Charles I. and aided Cromwell until the latter be
gan to assume great power. He then opposed Cromwell and
was an exile for many years, but was pardoned by Charles
II. His political enemies connected him with the Rye House
Plot, and caused his execution.
Line 20: "Amaranth." A flower that preserves its fresh
ness for a long time after being cut; hence an emblem of im
mortality.
GENERAL MONTGOMERY. — An American general (1736-1775),
who captured Montreal and was killed in the attempt to
take Quebec. His remains lie buried under the monument
in front of St. Paul's Church, New York.
Line 27: "Cyclops." Mythological giants, each having but
one eye. They helped Vulcan in making armor.
Line 28: "Saracen." Followers of Mohammed. They
were considered exceedingly cruel and bloodthirsty.
Line 29: "Mogul." A member of the Mongolian race.
Line 29: "Tartar." A member of an Asiatic tribe which
was powerful during the Middle Ages.
Line 37: "That was an Englishman." The purpose of
Brackenridge's plays was to arouse the fighting spirit in the
American people, and hence we find the emotions rather ex
aggerated. It must be remembered that some of the pros
perous merchants of Boston and New York and some of the
ancient families of Virginia gave all the plans for war a very
cool reception.
WILLIAM MUNFORD.
ILIAD. — The famous epic by the Greek poet, Homer (loth
century, B.C.). It describes the siege of Troy by the Greeks.
HECTOR. — The greatest warrior among the Trojans. He
was killed by Achilles and his body dragged through the
Greek camps.
Line 2: "Troy." An ancient city of Asia Minor, de
stroyed by the Greeks.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN" POETRY. 235
Line 5: "Jove." Jupiter, the chief god in classical mythol
ogy.
Line 17: "Saturnian." Saturn, Jove's predecessor, was be
lieved to have founded civilization and agriculture in Italy.
He is sometimes represented as Time, holding a scythe.
JOHN SHAW.
Line 12. Notice in the first twelve lines the slightly ex
aggerated descriptions of beautiful features and characteris
tics : "coral hue," "pearly treasures," "morning of thine eye,"
bosom's "snows," etc. This tendency is found in nearly all
love lyrics. Compare with this poem Annie Laurie, some
poems of Robert Burns, Pinkney's A Health and A Serenade,
Poe's To One in Paradise, and Samuel Minturn Peck's
Phyllis and A Southern Girl.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON.
Line 10: "That veils thy throne." Notice here, as else
where, evidences of the artistic sense of the poet. He sees
the light with an artist's eye. This is shown also in line 12
in the words "a blot in space."
S. T. COLERIDGE. — Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834),
one of the most famous essayists and poets in English litera
ture. His best poem is The Ancient Mariner. Coleridge and
Allston met in Italy and became close friends.
Line 16 : "Thy gentle voice." Coleridge was one of the
most brilliant talkers of the nineteenth century.
WILLIAM MAXWELL.
Line 7: "Phcenix." The never-dying bird of mythology.
At the close of every hundredth year of its existence it was
consumed in a fire enkindled by the rays of the sun, and was
236 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
recreated immediately, with all the strength and beauty of
youth. The bird was believed to live almost entirely alone.
Line n: "Venus." A very brilliant planet, sometimes oc
cupying a place as the Evening Star. It derives its name
from that of the Roman goddess of love.
RICHARD DABNEY.
EPIGRAM. — A brief, concise, pithy statement.
ARCHIAS. — A Greek poet known to modern times through
Cicero's famous oration, Pro Archia Pocta.
Line 22: "Lucifer." The Morning Star. The word comes
from the Latin and means "light-bearer."
Line 34: "Hesperus." A name given to the Evening Star
by the Greeks.
RICHARD HENRY WILDE.
Line 8: "But none shall weep." The last line of each
stanza possibly constitutes a weakness in this poem. To
many readers of to-day these words have a slight strain of
insincerity and sentimentality.
Line 29: "Yorick." The court fool whose skull was dug
up by the gravediggers, in Hamlet. "Alas, poor Yorick! I
knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite jest, of most ex
cellent fancy."
Line 32: "Abbot of Misrule." A master of Christmas
festivals who absolved all his followers of their wisdom and
reason.
Line 36: "Jaques." A melancholy, cynical character in
Shakespeare's As You Like It.
A FAREWELL TO AMERICA. — This poem refers to Wilde's
departure for Italy (1834).
Line 39: "More than fatherland." It should be remem
bered that the poet was a native of Ireland.
Line 55: "It may be years." He was abroad about four
years (1835-1840).
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 237
MIRABEAU BONAPARTE LAMAR.
THE DAUGHTER OF MENDOZA. — This poem is said to have
been written in honor of a beautiful woman in Argentine
Republic. The Mendoza is a river in that country.
EDWARD CO ATE PINKNEY.
A HEALTH. — This poem was composed in honor of a very
close friend of Pinkney's, Mrs. Rebecca Somerville, of Bal
timore. Notice the use of beautiful consonant and vowel
combinations. Compare it with Ben Jonson's Drink to Me
Only zvith Thine Eyes.
Line 49 : "Afghaun." A native of Afghanistan. The peo
ple are Mohammedans, but still retain many pagan ideas.
A SERENADE. — This was written in honor of Miss Mc-
Causland, whom Pinkney married in 1824.
GEORGE DENISON PRENTICE.
Line 12: "Worshiped his own loved sun." The ancient
Persians were sun worshipers.
THE CLOSING YEAR. — Compare this poem with Bryant's
Thanatopsis and The Flood of Years, Young's Night
Thoughts, and Wordsworth's The Excursion. Note carefully
the similarities and contrasts in their sentiment and structure.
Line 69: "Glass and scythe." This refers to the familiar
representation of Time as an old man carrying an hourglass
and a scythe.
Line 94 : "Pleiad." Seven stars are believed to have com
posed the Pleiades, but one has been lost in space. Compare
the poem with William Gilmore Simms's The Lost Pleiad.
WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS.
THE GRAPEVINE SWING.— This swing was at Simms's
home, "Woodlands." "The vine had drooped its festoons,
238 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
one below another, in such a way that half a dozen persons
. . . could find a comfortable seat, and yet not one of them
be sitting on a level with his neighbor." (W. P. Trent, Life
of William Gilmorc Simms.)
Line 43: "Of Chaldea." The Chaldean shepherd is here
identified with the Magi, who were astrologers.
EDGAR ALLAN POE.
Line 5 : "Giddy stars." "Giddy" here means not foolish
but bewildered or dizzy.
Line 12: "Levin." Lightning.
Line 26: "Houri." According to the Moslem teachings,
beautiful women, known as Houri, are given to the faithful
after death.
Line 51. Compare this with the closing lines of Shelley's
Skylark.
THE BELLS. — This poem appeared in its final form in Sar-
tain's Union Magazine December, 1849. The periodical gives
some portions of the original draft, and from them we may
judge how carefully Poe revised the lines and how great an
improvement he wrought. We quote one stanza:
"The bells !— ah, the bells !
The heavy iron bells !
Hear the tolling of the bells!
Hear the bells !
How horrible a monody there floats
From their throats —
From their deep-toned throats!
How I shudder at the notes
From the melancholy throats
Of the bells, bells, bells !
Of the bells!"
Line 61 : "Runic rhyme." The expression here means a
mystic rhyme, because of the unknown meaning of the an-
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 239
cient Runic writings. Notice throughout the poem the effects
of the vowel and consonant repetitions.
ANNABEL LEE.— Stedman, the American critic, says: "The
refrain and measure of this lyric suggest a reversion, in the
music-haunted brain of its author, to the songs and melodies
that, whether primitive or caught up, are favorites with the
colored race, and that must have been familiar to the poet
during his childhood in the South." The poem is an ex
pression of Poe's love for his wife.
Line 202: "I lie down." In the stormiest weather Poe lin
gered longest by his wife's grave.
THE RAVEN.— This poem received wide notice upon its
publication in the New York Evening Mirror in January,
1845. The editor, N. P. Willis, spoke of it as "unsurpassed
in English poetry for subtle conception, masterly ingenuity,
of versification, and consistent sustaining of imaginative lift."
It became widely known in England and made a strong im
pression upon every reader there. According to Mrs. Brown
ing, one lady took down her bust of Pallas, declaring that,
after reading this poem, she could not bear the sight of the
figure.
Line 242 : "Flirt and flutter." Poe states that for the pur
pose of making the latter part of the poem a striking con
trast, he made the approach of the bird as near "to the
ludicrous as was admissible."
Line 243: "A stately Raven." Poe told a friend that an
owl did come into his room in this manner; but that, in writ
ing the poem, he chose the raven as being more poetic.
Line 246: "Pallas." The goddess of arts and sciences,
often called Minerva. It will be noticed that the lover is
here a student.
Line 252: "Plutonian." Pluto was the god of the dark
underworld.
Line 287: "Nepenthe." A drink given by the gods for the
purpose of banishing sorrow.
Line 294: "Balm in Gilead." See Jeremiah viii. 22.
Line 298: "Aidenn." The Garden of Eden, but here rep
resenting the Future.
240 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
THE CONQUEROR WORM. — It is doubtful whether in all lit
erature there is a poem more filled with horror and despair.
It contains not one hopeful word.
Line 344: "Theater." The world.
Line 345 : "Play." Human life.
Line 348: "Mimes." The mimes represent men, who are
considered by Poe as mere toys of circumstance.
Line 358 : "Phantom." The phantom is complete happi
ness, which, of course, none obtain on this earth.
ALBERT PIKE.
Line 12: "Glad scorner of all cities." The mocking bird
is a very shy creature, and prefers secluded places for its
home.
Line 23: "yEolian." yEolus was the god of the winds;
hence the seolian harp is one played by the winds.
Line 34: "I cannot love." Compare this sentence with the
closing lines of Coleridge's Ancient Mariner. Compare the
entire poem with Keats's Ode to a Nightingale.
Line 88: "Red autumn." Notice the appropriateness of
the descriptive words here and in line 90 also.
Line 106: "Crescent Diana." Diana was the goddess of
hunting and represented the moon.
ALEXANDER BEAUFORT MEEK.
Line 19 : "Helvyn." Switzerland.
Line 19: "Tempe." A valley in Thessaly, where victors
in the ancient games were crowned.
Line 33: "Heaven's best gift to man." This is inaccurately
quoted from Milton's Paradise Lost, v. 18: "Heaven's last
best gift."
Line 70: "Petrarch." The great Italian poet (1304-1374),
whose sonnets to his mistress, Laura, are among the most
famous poems in all literature.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 241
Line 77: "Anacreon." A Greek poet (561 B.C.), who
wrote many lyrics on love.
Line 79: "Bird of music." Lines 79-82 have often been
quoted because of their happily worded description.
PHILIP PENDLETON COOKE.
FLORENCE VANE.— The poem was published in the Gentle
man's Magazine while Poe was editor (1839-1840). Poe was
very much an admirer of Cooke's work.
Line 13: "Elysian." Elysium was the mythological home
of the blest.
Line 22: "Without a main." The idea is a heart without
a resting place, without stability.
Compare this poem with Browning's The Last Ride To
gether and Landor's Rose Aylmer.
SEVERN TEACKLE WALLIS.
THE BLESSED HAND.— This poem was written to be sold at
the Southern Relief Fair, held at Baltimore shortly after the
Civil War. The proceeds, amounting to about $165,000, were
expended in reestablishing the ruined homes of the South.
Printed copies of The Blessed Hand were sold and brought
in no small share of the total amount. The poem is based
on a legend that an English monk at the monastery of
Aremberg spent his life beautifying books, and that when
his tomb was opened long after his death, his right hand
was found preserved from all decay.
Line 14: "Matin song." Matin, according to the Roman
Catholic order of worship, is the early morning hour for
prayer.
Line 20: "Missals." An ancient book containing the
church service.
Line 28: "Vesper chime." Vesper is the evening hour of
prayer. The chimes of nearly all European churches are
rung at this time.
16
242 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
AMELIA WELBY.
Line 8: "And held it trembling there." The last four lines
of this poem, because of their happy description, were for
merly often quoted.
Line 10: "Sad moan." This refers to the sound always
heard when a shell is placed against the ear.
THEODORE O'HARA.
Line 36: "Serried foe." The Mexicans, under General
Santa Anna, numbered 21,000; while the Americans, under
General Zachary Taylor, numbered but 4.769-
Line 41 : "Long has the doubtful conflict raged." The bat
tle lasted more than ten hours, and the losses on both sides
were exceedingly heavy.
Line 47: "Stout old chieftain." Taylor, who had been in
command of Kentuckians during the War of 1812, was the
idol of his men, and doubtless deserved their admiration.
Line 58: "Angostura." The word means "the narrows,"
and is the name of a pass near the battlefield.
Line 65: "Dark and Bloody Ground." This is the mean
ing of the Indian word "Kentucky."
Line 75: "Spartan mother's breast." According to the
Greek story, the Spartan mother handed the shield to her
son with these words : "Come back with this or upon this."
PLANTATION MELODIES.
MOURNER'S SONG.— -This little lyric gives some conception
of the religion and "theology" of the ante-bellum negro. Like
all primitive races, he made more of God's might and de
structive powers than of God's love.
ROLL, JORDAN, ROLL.— This song and Swing Low, Sweet
Chariot were probably the most popular of ante-bellum negro
hymns. The tunes are weird, but exceedingly melodious.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN TOETRY. 243
Line^iS : "Youah days be long." See Psalm xxi. 4; xxxiv.
II ; xci. 16; Proverbs iii. i; ix. u; x. 27.
Line 25: "Histe de window." In order to give vent to the
emotions, such side remarks are very often used in negro
melodies. Ejuculations fulfilling much the same purpose are
sometimes found in the Psalms.
SWING Low, SWEET CHARIOT.— See Psalm Ixviii. 17; Isaiah
Ixvi. 15; Revelation ix. 9.
Line 57: "Silvah spade," "gol'en chain," etc. Descriptions
of vast wealth, rich ornaments, and luxurious surroundings
are very common in these old hymns. It is a significant
fact that the Psalms— themselves rich in such descriptions-
were the favorite portion of the Scriptures among the earlier
negroes.
LAY Dis BODY DOWN.— In these crude lines one finds a
suggestion of the course of life: conscious existence "I
knows moon-rise, I knows star-rise;" death— "I walks in de
graveyard, I walks troo de graveyard;" resurrection— "I
goes to de judgment in de evenin' of de day;" and heaven—
"An' my soul and youah soul will meet in de day
When I lays dis body down."
CIVIL WAR SONGS.
These specimens are given not because of poetic merit but
to show the spirit of the time. However crude they may
appear, they were well suited for the singers around the camp
fire.
Line 3: "Lice of Egypt." See Exodus viii. 16; Psalm
cv. 31.
Line 9: "Old Kentucky is caved from under." Kentucky
was restrained from giving much aid to the Confederacy be
cause of the early arrival of Union troops on her soil.
Line 10: "Tennessee is split asunder." The larger portion
244 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
of East and Middle Tennessee did not wish to secede. In
these sections families divided, and brother fought brother.
Line 13: "Old John Brown is dead and gone." John Brown
had been executed for attempting to raise an insurrection
among the slaves.
Line 14: "His spirit." This refers sarcastically to a popu
lar Union song about John Brown, containing the words:
"His soul goes marching on."
Line 16: "An ape's from Illinois." The words refer to
Abraham Lincoln.
Line 17. The sentiments expressed in this line and the
following ten or twelve show the general feeling of the times.
No one thought that the war would last any length of time
or be anything serious.
THE BONNIE BLUE FLAG. — A little Irishman, Harry Mc-
Carty by name, was the author of this song and made it
popular by singing it to "crowded houses" throughout the
South. It illustrates very well the spirit with which the
South entered into the war.
THE SOLDIER BOY. — This poem, which is of no small merit,
was first published in a Virginia paper and was copied
widely.
Line 66: "Damascus." A city of Syria, perhaps the oldest
in the world, once famous for its fine swords.
Line 81. The thought in the comparison that follows is
noble. Just as this sword is handed on, so a worthy cause
or sentiment is bequeathed from generation to generation.
MARGARET PRESTON.
Line 6: "The footsteps of angels drawing near." The
"text" of the poem is drawn from Genesis xviii. 1-3: "And
Abraham sat in the tent door in the heat of the day; and
he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by
him: and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the
tent door, and bowed himself toward the ground, and said,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 245
My Lord, if now I have found favor in thy sight, pass not
away, I pray thee, from thy servant."
THE HERO OF THE COMMUNE. — Commune de Paris, a po
litical organization of socialists and workingmen who re
volted against the French government March 17, 1871.
Notice the dramatic quality of this poem. How is it
gained ?
Line i : "Garc.on." A French word for "boy."
Line 46: "Sacre." A French interjection.
Line 67: "Saint Denis." The patron saint of France. He
was the first bishop of Paris, and suffered martyrdom in
272.
Line 78: "Parbleu." A French interjection.
Line 79: "Ncy." A famous French general (1789-1815),
one of the chief officers. in Napoleon's army.
Line 94: "Faith that had yearnings." Stonewall Jackson
was a very devout Christian.
A GRAVE IN HOLLYWOOD CEMETERY, RICHMOND. — The grave
was that of the poet, John R. Thompson, whose ill health
had made him an exile.
Line in: "Dante." The greatest Italian poet (1265-1321),
who was exiled by political enemies. He died at Ravenna.
Line 131 : "Mystic cable." A comparison to the ocean tel
egraph cable.
Line 135 : "Mellow rhymes." See the specimens of Thomp
son's poetry given in this book.
Line 139: "Provengal-like." It was formerly the custom
of the singers of Provence, France, to wander from town
to town, or from castle to castle, composing and singing
their lyrics.
Line 141 : "Virginia's name." Thompson was a native of
Virginia.
Line 144: "Whose ringing ballad." The ballad is Thomp
son's The Death of Stuart.
Line 145 : "Bold Stuart." James Ewell Brown Stuart
(1833-1864) was a famous Confederate cavalry leader who
was noted for his daring raids and attacks.
246 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR.
LITTLE GIFFEN. — The story told in this stirring poem is
true. A boy from East Tennessee was nursed back to life
at Torch Hill, Dr. Ticknor's home, and had scarcely re
turned to the rank when he fell in battle. Maurice Thomp
son has said of the poem: "If there is a finer lyric than this
in the whole realm of poetry, I should be glad to read it."
Line 12 : "Lazarus." See Luke xvi. 20.
Line 25 : "Johnston." General Joseph Johnston, a Con
federate leader.
Line 32: "Knights of Arthur's ring." The reference is to
the companions of King Arthur, the ancient Celtic ruler,
whose Round Table represents in literature the noblest phases
of knighthood.
VIRGINIANS OF THE VALLEY. — This poem was written by
Ticknor shortly after hearing that the Virginia soldiers had
successfully resisted the invading Union forces.
Line 44: "Raleigh." Sir Walter Raleigh, the English ex
plorer, sent colonizing expeditions to Virginia; but it is
believed that he himself never came to its shores.
Line 45 : "Smith." Captain John Smith was decidedly the
ablest leader among the early colonists in Virginia.
Line 58: "Golden Horseshoe Knights." Early in the
eighteenth century Alexander Spotswood, Governor of Vir
ginia from 1710 to 1723, explored and took possession of the
Valley of Virginia. Tradition says that he presented each
one of the exploring party with a small gold horseshoe.
JOHN REUBEN THOMPSON.
Music IN CAMP.— During parts of 1862 and 1863 both
armies were encamped on the banks of the Rappahannock.
The poem illustrates how little personal animosity exists be
tween members of hostile armies.
Line 65 : "Iris." The rainbow.
Line 76: "One touch of Nature." The expression is drawn
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 247
from Shakespeare's famous line: "One touch of nature
makes the whole world kin." (Troilus and Cressida, III., 3.)
THE BATTLE RAINBOW. — Just after a great storm the day
before the Seven Days' Fighting a rainbow spanned the Con
federate camp.
Line 99: "Slipp'ry intrenchment," "reddened redoubt."
Notice the poet's use of adjective to impress the idea of the
dreadfulness of war.
Line 103: "Day unto day." See Psalm xix. 2. The happy
phrasing of this sentence has often been pointed out.
JAMES MATH EWES LEG ARE.
Line n: "Mede." A native of Media, a country of Asia,
conquered by Cyrus and made a part of Persia by him.
Line 14: "Stones for bread." See Matthew vii. 9.
Compare Ahab Mohammed with Lowell's Vision of Sir
Launfal and Leigh Hunt's Abou Ben Adhem.
To A LILY. — With its dainty conceits and delicate phrasing,
this poem serves as another good example of the lighter
poetry of the South. Compare it with Shaw's Song, Max
well's To a Fair Lady, Lamar's The Daughter of Mendoza,
Pinkney's A Health, Cooke's Florence Vane, and Peck's
Phyllis.
Line 62: "Venus." The Roman goddess of love and beau
ty was supposed to have sprung from the foam of the sea.
JAMES BARRON HOPE.
ARMS AND THE MAN. — The poem was delivered at the cele
bration of the one hundredth anniversary of the surrender
of Cornwallis. The title is from the opening words of Virgil's
sEneid: "Arma virumque cano."
Line 19: "Cromwell's proffered flow'rs." Cromwell en
deavored to remove the New England colonists to Jamaica.
248 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Line 24: "Reap the seas." They became fishermen and
sailors.
Line 27 : "Leviathan." The monster mentioned in the
book of Job.
Line 35: "Changed to gold." The Middle Group, espe
cially New York and Pennsylvania, became wealthy with as
tonishing rapidity.
Line 45 : "Linked Silver Lakes." The expression refers
to the Erie Canal, which owes its existence to the energetic
Dewitt Clinton (1769-1828), once governor of New York.
Line 53 : "Uppowock." An old name for tobacco.
Line 55: "Plenty's Horn." The ancient emblem, or sym
bol, known as the cornucopia, or horn of plenty, is con
tained in the seal of North Carolina.
Line 58: "Roanoke Island." In 1587 John White left a
company of colonists on Roanoke Island. Upon his return
from England, he could find scarcely a trace of them, and
for over three centuries the mystery has remained without
accurate solution. It is believed that they joined the Croa-
tan Indians, a tribe now living in Robeson County, N. C.
The traditions, speech, and family names of these Indians
seem to confirm this theory.
Line 60 : "Opecancanough." An Indian chief, brother of
Powhatan.
Line 73: "Semi-feudal." When vast estates and slavery
existed in the South, the conditions in society were some
what like those under the ancient feudal system.
Line 86: "Golden Horse Shoes." Sec the note to Ticknor's
Virginians of the Valley.
Line 88: "Cavaliers." Many Virginia families are de
scendants of the Cavaliers, who opposed Cromwell.
THE CHARGE AT BALAKLAVA.— This is the famous charge
described by Tennyson in his Charge of the Light Brigade,
with which Hope's poem should be compared. The battle
field is in Southern Russia, near the Black Sea, and the
struggle was between the armies of England, France, Sar
dinia, and Turkey, on the one hand, and the Russians on the
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHER^ POETRY. H9
other. Through a mistake, the English light cavalry, con
sisting of 600 men, charged into the thick of the battle, and
only 150 escaped death.
SUNSET ON HAMPTON ROADS. — These famous waters off
the coast of Virginia compose one of the finest harbors in the
world.
HENRY TIMROD.
SONNET. — Timrod's sonnets are among the finest in Amer
ican literature. He was an ardent admirer of Wordsworth,
and their sonnets are similar in their seriousness, simplicity,
and clearness.
THE SUMMER BOWER. — This poem may serve as a good
specimen of Timrod's Nature-poetry. It will be seen that
he gains not only pleasure but a moral lesson from the
beautiful scene. The moral lesson here should be compared
with that in Bryant's Thanatopsis, Lanier's Sunrise, and
Longfellow's Sunrise on the Hills.
CAROLINA. — Doubtless this is the finest war poem written
for the* Confederate cause. "In Carolina the lyrical passion
of Timrod reaches its highest point ; ... its passionate
fire, its lyrical charm, its pulse of stormy music, place it
among the permanent contributions to American literature."
(Hamilton W. Mabie, in The Outlook, 1901.)
Line 96: "Children of the hill." Timrod probably had in
mind the people of the northern hill country of South
Carolina. For a long time they had very little to do with
the inhabitants of the Charleston section; and, indeed, the
State College owes its origin to the endeavors to unite more
firmly the two peoples.
Line no: "Eutaw's battle-bed." In the Revolutionary
battle at Eutaw Springs the Americans, commanded by Gen
eral Green, gained the victory.
Line 114: "Rutledge," "Laurens." John Rutledge was
President of South Carolina from 1776 to 1778, and was
250 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
afterwards Governor. John Laurens was a young American
colonel who arose from a sickbed to fight the British in
vaders of South Carolina, and was killed in the first conflict.
Line 117: "Marion." General Francis Marion (1732-1795),
known as the "Swamp Fox," was one of the most famous
leaders in the Revolutionary War. His field of action was,
for the most part, in his native State, South Carolina.
Line 128: "Huns." The Asiatic tribe that invaded Rome
in the fourth century. Here the name is applied to the
Union troops.
Line 133 : "Sachem's Head to Sumter's wall." Sachem's
Head is a mountain in northwestern South Carolina ; while
Sumter is, of course, the famous fort near Charleston.
THE COTTON BOLL. — There is an extraordinary strength
and vividness of imagination in these lines. Says Dr. Barrett
Wendell in his Literary History of America: "The sense of
Nature which it reveals is as fine, as true, and as simple as
that which makes so nearly excellent Whittier's poems about
New England landscape."
Line 205 : "Cirque." Circle. Notice how the poet's imagi
nation gradually widens until it includes the whole world.
Line 232: "Uriel." One of the seven angels that stand
near God's throne. Milton, in Paradise Lost, III., 648-650,
speaks of him in these words :
"The archangel Uriel, one of the seven
Who in God's presence, nearest to his throne,
Stand ready at command, and are his eyes."
Line 265 : "Poet of The Woodlands.' " William Gilmore
Simms (1806-1870), novelist, poet, and literary leader of the
South before the Civil War, whose home, "The Woodlands,"
was near Charleston, was one of Timrod's truest and most
inspiring friends.
Line 300: "Cornwall." The reference is to the tin and
coal mines of Cornwall, England, which extend out under
the bed of the ocean.
Line 329: "Goth." The Goths were fierce northern tribes
which invaded Rome. Here the Union soldiers are meant.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 25!
Line 334: "The Port which ruled the Western seas." The
'Tort" is New York, which many Southerners believed was
unjustly usurping American commerce.
The Cotton Boll should be compared with such poems as
Lanier's Corn and Sunrise, Hayne's In the Wheat Field,
Whitman's Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking, and Bayard
Taylor's The Romance of Maize.
PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE.
LYRIC OF ACTION.— A man wrote Hayne, declaring that he
had been saved from suicide by this poem. It is one of the
few poems in which Hayne is hortatory.
Line 27: "The seraph who rules in the sun." See the
note to Uriel, under the selections from Timrod. "And I
saw an angel standing in the sun." (Revelation xixr^i;.)
Line 37 : "To seek new homes on far Italian plains." Such
a migration took place in 708 B.C.
Line 38: "Apollo's oracle." Apollo was the Greek god of
music and prophecy. Among his oracles the most famous
was at Delphi.
Line 57 : "Aethra." The word means "clear sky."
Line 61 : "Tarentum." A city, now known as Taranto,
situated in Southern Italy.
MY STUDY.— This poem, which was published in 1859, re
fers to the poet's home at Charleston, and not to the rude
cottage where he spent his later years. These lines reveal
Hayne's quiet, meditative nature.
Line 73: "Arcadies." The inhabitants of Arcady, a dis
trict of Greece, were simple in their tastes and very happy;
hence a place where life is exceedingly plain and happy is
frequently called "Arcady."
THE MOCKING BIRD.— "There is probably no bird in the
world that possesses all the musical qualifications ^ of this
king of song, who has derived all from Nature's self."
(Audubon.) More than thirty of the better-known American
252 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
poets have written about this bird, among them being Pike,
Wilde, Meek, Timrod, Lanier, Longfellow, and Whitman.
Compare Hayne's poem with Wordsworth's To the Skylark,
Shelley's To a Skylark, Keats's Ode to a Nightingale, Shakes
peare's Hark, Hark, the Lark, Whitman's Out of the Cradle
Endlessly Rocking, and with the various poems about the
nightingale given in this volume.
Line 96: "It rose in dazzling spirals overhead." It is a
fact that the mocking bird rises, in its singing, from bough
to bough, the loudest and sweetest music being produced
when the top of the tree is reached.
THE PINE'S MYSTERY. — Hayne loved the pine tree. Among
his poems on this subject are Under the Pines, The Axe and
the Pine, In the Pine Barrens, The Dryad of the Pines,
Aspect of the Pines, and The Voice of the Pines.
Line 1 13 : "Ghana." A gypsy dancer.
Line 118: "Monotone." The reference is to the moaning
sound continually produced in the pines by the wind.
JAMES RYDER RANDALL.
Line 5 : "Patriotic gore." The reference is to the rioting
that took place during the passage of Massachusetts troops
through Baltimore, April, 1861.
Line 21: "Carroll." A Maryland patriot (1737-1832), and
signer of the Declaration of Independence. He was for some
time the sole survivor of the famous group whose names
appear on the document.
Line 22: "Howard." John Eager Howard (1752-1827)
was a Maryland officer whose troops won the battle of
Cowpens.
Line 29: "Ringgold." A Maryland officer (1800-1840) who
was killed at Palo Alto in the Mexican War.
Line 30: "Watson." Colonel William Watson, of Balti
more, was killed at Monterey during the Mexican War.
Line 31 : "Lowe." Enoch Lewis Lowe was a soldier in the
Mexican War, and afterwards Governor of Maryland.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 253
Line 31: "May." Charles Augustus May (1817-1864), of
Maryland, was a conspicuous leader at the battle of Monte
rey.
Line 38 : "Sic semper." A portion of the Latin motto : Sic
semper tyrannis ("Thus ever with tyrants").
Line 59: "Vandal." The Vandals, or Goths, were a wild
Germanic tribe that plundered Rome in 455.
Line 72: "Northern scum." This expression is another
instance of the unreasoning bitterness that sprang into ex
istence just before the long conflict.
ABRAM JOSEPH RYAN.
THE CONQUERED BANNER. — This poem, which is said to
have been written at Knoxville, Tenn., shortly after Lee's
surrender, was first published in The Banner of the South,
March, 1868.
NIGHT THOUGHTS.— When this poem was first published,
in The Banner of the South, June, 1870, it bore the title,
Night Thoughts; but in the volume of his collected poems it
is called The Rosary of My Tears.
Line 80: "Better a day of strife." This sentiment is very
true to Ryan. He was a man of great energy and passionate
feelings.
THE SWORD OF ROBERT LEE.— To this day the chief heroes
of the Confederate cause are Lee and Stonewall Jackson. In
sincerity, earnestness, bravery, and positive manliness, the
four illustrious men produced by those terrible times, Lin
coln, Grant, Lee, and Jackson, have scarcely been equaled in
all history.
SONG OF THE MYSTIC. — Again the sentiment is true to the
poet. In this poem we see something of Ryan's life, with its
passions, struggles, and final victories. Compare with it Long
fellow's Psalm of Life, Newman's Lead, Kindly Light, Ten
nyson's Crossing the Bar, Lanier's Sunrise, and Poe's The
Conqueror Worm.
254 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
SIDNEY LANIER.
A BALLAD OF TREES AND THE MASTER. — In this first selec
tion we find two leading characteristics of Lanier : love of
Nature and admiration for the pure and lofty. Undoubtedly
it is one of the tenderest poems about Jesus ever written.
THE MARSHES OF GLYNN. — This is the first one of four
"Marsh Hymns" composed by Lanier. It was his intention
to write six. The Marshes of Glynn are in Glynn County,
near Brunswick, Ga. Many poets have sung of the beauties
of mountains, valleys, and seas; but Lanier, in his descriptions
of marshes, or swamps, is almost alone.
Line 24: "Of the dim sweet woods, of the dear dark
woods." Notice throughout the entire poem the use of allit
eration, the repetition of certain combinations of sounds, the
repetition of entire phrases, the internal rhymes, and the
general agreement of the sound with the sense.
Line 30: "Arras." Hangings, or tapestry.
Line 31 : "Pleasure of prayer." The deeply religious
nature of Lanier is shown here as in many other lines of
his poems. While too broad for special creeds, he was in
deed a lover of what he so often called the "beauty of
holiness."
Line 41 : "My soul all day hath drunken the soul of the
oak." This is but one of the many lines which might be
quoted to show the poet's passionate love for Nature in all
her forms.
Line 84: "Catholic." Broad-minded, expansive, universal.
Line 87: "As the marsh hen secretly builds on the watery
sod." In all American literature there can scarcely be found
lines expressing such an unfaltering trust in God.
Line 105 : "Farewell, my lord Sun." These words may
be compared with the last lines of Sunrise:
"Oh, never the mast-high run of the seas
Of traffic shall hide thee,
Never the hell-colored smoke of the factories
Hide thee,
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 255
Never the reek of the time's fen-politics
Hide thee,
And ever my heart through the night shall with knowledge
abide thee,
And ever by day shall my spirit, as one that hath tried thee,
Labor, at leisure, in art— till yonder beside thee
My soul shall float, friend Sun,
The day being done."
SONG OF THE CHATTAHOOCHEE.— Dr. Charles W. Kent has
said of this poem: "It sings itself, and yet nowhere sacri
fices the thought. Poe's Ulalume and Tennyson's Brook, or
whatever other poem you may choose with which to com
pare this highest achievement of our artist's musical art, will
find in this a fair and unyielding competitor."
Line 122: "Habersham." The Chattahoochce runs through
Habersham and Hall Counties, in Northeast Georgia.
Line 134: "The rushes cried, Abide, abide." Notice the
effective comparisons to the temptations of life. Compare this
poem with Tennyson's Brook, Southey's Cataract of Lodorc,
Poe's Ulalume (for technical qualities), and Hayne's The
River and The Meadow Brook.
JOHN HENRY BONER.
POE'S COTTAGE AT FORDHAM.— During the year 1846-47 Poe
and his wife lived in a small cottage at Fordham, near
New York City, and there on January 30, 1847, the beloved
wife died.
Line 9: "Wintry winds and cheerless." The winter spent
in this little cottage was one of poverty and distress to the
Poes.
Line 19 : "Lost star of seven." One of the Pleiades. See
Simms's The Lost Pleiad.
Line 23: "Suspected powers." The reference is to the
misfortunes which Poe surely saw approaching and which
he knew he could not escape.
256 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Line 25 : "Apollo." The god of music.
Line 26: "Astarte." Ashtoreth, the goddess of the moon,
often identified with Venus, the goddess of love and beauty.
Line 28 : "Dis." Pluto, the god of the dark underworld.
Line 33: "Proud, mad, but not defiant." This is a true
picture of Poe until his wife's death. For some time after
that catastrophe he seemed but a wreck, without pride, with
out ambition.
Line 40: "Israfel." The singing angel spoken of in the
Koran and taken by Poe as the subject of one of his most
musical poems.
Line 55: "Malice that belied him." Many of the evil re
ports about Poe's habits and death were originated by ene
mies whom he had made by his harsh literary criticisms.
THE LIGHT'OOD FIRE.— "Light'ood" is the term often used
for "lightwood," or pine firewood, in the mountains of North
Carolina and Tennessee.
Line 71 : "Bpreas." The north wind.
CARLYLE McKINLEY.
SAPELO.— Sapelo Island is near Darien, Ga.
Line 28. Five stanzas are omitted at this point
Line 48. Two stanzas are omitted at this point.
Line 64. Six stanzas are omitted at this point.
WILL HENRY THOMPSON.
GETTYSBURG.— The battle of4 Gettysburg began on July i,
1863, and continued until July 4- After one of the most
desperate struggles in history, the Union forces, under Gen
eral Meade, overcame the Confederates under General Robert
E. Lee. The Federals took 13,621 prisoners.
Line 6: "Lee." Robert E. Lee (1807-1870), Commander
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 257
in Chief of the Confederate army, graduated at the head of
his class at West Point in 1829, served in the Mexican War,
was Superintendent of West Point from 1852 to 1855, re
signed his commission as colonel in the United States army
in 1861 to take charge of the Confederate forces, and after
the war became President of Washington College (after
wards Washington and Lee University), Lexington, Va.
Line 8: "Pickett." George E. Pickctt (1825-1875) gradu
ated at West Point in 1846, served through the Mexican
War, and, as a Confederate general, became noted for his
almost reckless bravery.
Line 13: "Shiloh." The battle of Shiloh was fought on
April 6 and 7, 1862, at Pittsburg Landing, Tenn. After a
most bloody struggle, General Grant overcame the Confed
erate leaders, A. S. Johnston and Beauregard.
Line 14: "Chickamauga." On September 19 and 20, 1863,
the Confederates, under Bragg, met the Federals, under Rose-
crans, at Chickamauga, about twelve miles east of Chatta
nooga, and, after heavy losses had been sustained by both
armies, the Union troops retired.
Line 17: "Pettigrew." James Johnston Pcttigrew (1828-
1863), a brigadier general of Confederate forces, was badly
wounded at Gettysburg, where he had charge of a division.
Line 20: "Waterloo." On June 18, 1815, the forces of
England, Holland, Belgium, Hanover, Brunswick, Nassau,
Prussia, Saxony, and other European States, under the com
mand of Wellington and Bliicher, met Napoleon's army near
Waterloo, in Belgium, and routed it.
Line 21: "Kemper." James Lawson Kemper (1823-1895),
a brigadier general in the Confederate army, was severely
wounded and was captured at Gettysburg.
Line 22: "Garnett." Robert Selden Garnett (1821-1861)
was a Confederate officer killed at Carrick's Ford.
Line 25: "Armistead." Lewis A. Armistead, a brigadier
general in the Confederate army, was killed at Gettysburg.
Line 35: "Doubleday." General Abner Doubleday (1820-
1893) had charge of a Union corps at Gettysburg.
17
258 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
IRWIN RUSSELL.
CHRISTMAS NIGHT IN THE QUARTERS.— This poem appeared
in Scribner's Magazine January, 1878. The "quarters" was
the term formerly applied to the group of negro cabins on
the plantation.
Line 46: "Buck-kannon." Buchanan. It was formerly a
custom to name oxen after the Presidents.
Line 59: " Tis books that show us how to think." In this
line Russell gives a sharp rap at our modern ideas concerning
the importance of books in the development of an educated,
thinking man. Is he right or wrong?
Line 81 : "You knows." Notice the unconventional way of
addressing God. The Creator was a most personal God to
the old-time negro preacher.
Line 91 : "A-feelin' like King David when he cut de pigeon
wing." "And David danced before the Lord with all his
might." (2 Samuel vi. 14-)
Line 101 : "We'll need de blessin' more'n ef we's doin'
right." Is there any defect in this logic?
Line 103: "Sheriffs." Seraphs.
Line 112: "Sound his A." The "A" string is the one to
which the other violin strings are tuned.
Line 147: "Georgy Sam." It is still a custom among the
negroes to place before the name of a conspicuous character
the name of his native State.
Line 189: "Herald" The reference is probably to the
Vicksburg (Miss.) Herald, a paper for which Russell did
some work.
Line 191 : "Natchez." A famous steamboat on the Mis
sissippi.
Line 198: "Morgan." A large and exceedingly strong
breed of horses.
Line 203: "Bitters." A drink composed mainly of rum.
Line 240: "He climbs the fence." Notice the lack of dig
nity in Santa Claus's departure.
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 259
HENRY JEROME STOCKARD.
Line 3 : "Triton." A god of the sea.
Line 3: "Nereids." Sea nymphs.
Line 4: "Poseidon." Neptune, lord of the sea.
Line 5: "Pan." A god of the Greek shepherds, and later
a war god.
YATES SNOWDEN.
Line 60: "Drap d'ete." Clothes in the latest fashion.
Line 66: "Emigre." Emigrant.
Line 73: "Loyal je serai durant ma vie." I shall be loyal
throughout my life.
MADISON CAWEIN.
Line 66: "Thou wouldst not have her weep." This is the
idea, which has^ persisted through all ages, that the souls of
the departed rejoice and sorrow with the living. The senti
ment is expressed in a masterly manner in Rossetti's The
Blessed Daniozel.
Line 80: "Hast thou not all, all that thou ever hadst?" The
expression refers, of course, to the nature, or soul, of a
fellow-being, the part that we really love. Although the
flesh may disappear in death, the characteristics and the per
sonality of the departed live on in our memory. Is there
much consolation, however, in this thought to one who has
lost a friend? Do we not mourn, to no small degree, for
the loss of the fleshly form?
LIZETTE WOODWORTH REESE.
Line i: "Brambles." Notice throughout the poem one of
the main characteristics of Southern poetry — a sincere love
for Nature. The luxuriant vegetation and noble scenery
have lost none of that effect which in the past inspired Pike,
Timrod, Hayne, Lanier, and a host of others.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
American Anthology. Stedman. Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
American Authors. Rutherford. Franklin Publishing Co.
American Literature. Hart. Eldridge Brothers.
American Sonnets. Stedman. Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
American Encyclopedia. D. Appleton & Co.
Bivouac of the Dead and Its Author. Ranck.
Cyclopedia of American Biography. D. Appleton & Co.
Ballad History of the American Revolution. Moore.
Colonial Literature. Trent and Wells.
Colonial and Revolutionary Periods. Tyler.
Contemporaries. Higginson.
Cyclopedia of American Literature. Duychinck.
DeBow's Commercial Review.
Dictionary of Authors. Allibone.
Essays and Notes. Bayard Taylor.
Female Poets of America. Griswold.
Golden Leaves from American Poets. (Boston, 1865.)
History of Virginia. Cooke. (American Commonwealth
Series.)
History of Southern Literature. Holliday. Neale Co.
In the Poe Circle. Benton.
Library of American Literature. Stedman and Hutchinson.
Charles L. Webster & Co.
Library of the World's Best Literature. Warner. R. S.
Peale and J. A. Hill.
Life of William Gilmore Simms. Trent. (American Men
of Letters Series.)
Life of Poe. Woodberry. (American Men of Lett
Series.)
Life of Lamer. Minis. Houghton, Mifflin & Co.
Life, Literary Labors, and Neglected Grave of R. H. Wilde.
Jones.
Literary History of America. Wendell.
(260)
THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY. 26 1
Literati of New York. Poe.
Literature of the Virginias. Ogden. Independent Pub
lishing Co.
Living Writers of the South. Davidson. (New York,
1869.)
Louisiana Studies. Fortier. F. F. Hansell. (New Or
leans.)
Memorial of Sidney Lanier. Gilman.
Mind and Art of Poe. Fruit.
National Cyclopedia of American Biography James F
White & Co.
Negro Minstrelsy, Ancient and Modern. Trux.
New International Encyclopedia. Dodd, Mead & Co.
Oddities in Southern Life and Character. Watterson.
Pioneers of Southern Literature. Link.
Poets and Poetry of America. Griswold.
Poets of America. Stedman.
Publications of Modern Language Association.
Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society.
Questions at Issue. Gosse.
Sewanee Review. (Sewanee, Tenn.)
^Slave Songs of the United States. Allen, Ware, and Gar
rison.
Songs and Ballads. Moore.
Songs of the Slave. Brown.
Songs of the South. Clark. Lippincott.
South Atlantic Quarterly. (Durham, N. C.)
Southern Literary Messenger (1834-1863).
Southern Writers. Trent. Macmillan Co.
Southern Writers Series. Baskervill.
Southland Writers. Raymond.
Southern Literature. Manly. B. F. Johnson Publishing
Company.
Southern Quarterly Review. (1842-1855.)
Southern Review. (Baltimore.)
_ Southern Poetry Prior to 1860. B. F. Johnson Publish
ing Company.
Southern Poets. Abernathy. Maynard, Merrill & Co.
262 THREE CENTURIES OF SOUTHERN POETRY.
Southern Poets. Weber. Macmillan Company.
Southern Writers. Baskervill.
The Holy Grail. Scherer. Lippincott Company.
The Land We Love. (1865-1869.)
The Old South. Page.
Under the Microscope. Swinburne.
War Songs and Poems of the Southern Confederacy.
Wharton. ( Philadelphia. )
Women of the South in Literature. Forrest.
Younger American Poets. Sladen.
INDEX.
PAGE.
A
Aethra 155
Ahab Mohammed 130
Allston, Washington 39
Alsop, George 22
Annabel Lee 72
Arms and the Man 133
Bacon's Epitaph 23
Ballad of Trees and the
Master, A 175
Battle Cry of Freedom.. 112
Battle Rainbow, The 128
Beechenbrook 116
Beginnings, The 13
Bells, The 69
Bessie Brown, M.D 207
Bivouac of the Dead1, The. 98
Blessed Hand, The 94
Boner, John Henry 182
Bonnie Bine Flag, The. . . 113
Brackenridge, Hugh Hen
ry 32
Branch of May, A 228
Call All 112
Calling the Angels In... 116
Captain's Feather, The... 208
Carolina 145
Carolina Bourbon, A 217
Cawein, Madison 224
PAGE.
Charge at Balaklava,
The 136
Children, The 223
Christmas Night in the
Quarters 197
Civil War Period, The.. 103
Civil War Songs in
Closing Year, The 58
Colonial Ballads 1 16
Comes One with a Song. 213
Conquered Banner, The. 162
Conqueror Worm, The.. . 80
Cook, Ebenezer 25
Cook, Philip Pendleton.. 92
Corn 174
Cotton Boll, The 147
Dabney, Richard 44
Dandridge, Danske 219
Daughter of Mendoza,
The 53
Days of My Youth 35
Dead, The 109
Dead Moon, The 220
Death of General Mont
gomery, The 34
Death of Winter, The 195
Dedication 194
Disenchantment of Death. 225
English Novel, The 174
(263)
264
INDEX.
PAGE.
Epigram Imitated from
Archias, An 44
Eulogy of George Wash
ington, The 32
Every Year. . . 86
Expansion, The Period
of 47
Farewell to America, A.. 51
Florence Vane 92
From Cliff and Scaur. . . . 223
Froissart Ballads 92
General Surveys.
15, 29, 49, 105, 171
God's Acres 94
Grady, Henry 171
Grapevine Swing, The. 62, 209
Grave in Hollywood
Cemetery, Richmond, A 120
H
Half-Ring Moon, The.... 185
Harris, Joel Chandler.... 197
Harrison, Mrs. Burton. . 159
Hayne, Paul Hamilton.
123, 141, 152
Hayne, William Hamil
ton 212
Health, A 55
Heart's Quest, The 186
Heaven 109
He Goes to Court 26
He Meets a Quaker 25
Hero of the Commune,
The . .118
PAGE.
High Tide at Gettysburg,
The 191
Homer 216
Hope, James Barren 133
Hymns of the Marshes... 175
Hymns to the Gods 82
Immortality 39
In a King-Cambyses Vein. 186
In de Mornin' no
In Sorrow's Hour 228
Israfel 67
I Wonder What Maud
Will Say 207
J
Jackson, Stonewall 119
Joy and Other Poems 219
K
Key, Francis Scott 40
Knot of Blue, A 207
Lamar, Mirabeati Bona
parte 53
Land of the South 88
Lanier, Sidney 141, 173
Last of the Hours, The. . 94
Lay Dis Body Down in
Legare, James Mathewes. 130
Legends and Lyrics 153
Life of Hugh S. Legare. 153
Life of Robert Y. Hayne. 153
Light on the Hills 214
Light'ood Fire, The 184
Lines to a Lady 58
Little Folks Down South. 213
INDEX.
26S
PAGE
Little Giffen 123
Longfellow, Henry Wads-
worth 152
Lost Pleiad, The 62
Love and a Day 227
Lyric of Action 154
Lyrics and Idylls 224
M
Mabie, Hamilton Wright.
153, 175
Malone, Walter 229
Marshes of Glynn, The. . 175
Maryland, My Maryland. 112
Maxwell, William 43
McKinley, Carlyle 188
Meek, Alexander Beau
fort 88
Mocking Bird, The... 90, 156
Mountain of the Lovers,
The 153
Mourner's Song 108
Munford, William 36
Music and Poetry 174
Music in Camp I26
My Maryland 159
My Star. T86
My Study I56
N
Newes from Virginia...! 17
New South, The 169
Night Thoughts 164
O
October j^g
O'Hara, Theodore 98
Old Songs and New.. . 116
PAGE.
On the Late S. T. Cole
ridge 4o
Orta-Undis 130
Outcast and Other Poems,
The 229
Page, Thomas Nelson... 197
Partisan, The 61
Peck, Samuel Minturn... 206
Period of Expansion,
The 47
Phyllis 210
Pike, Albert 82
Pine's Mystery, The 157
Pinkney, Edward Coate.. 54
Plantation Melodies 107
Poe, Edgar Allan.
65, 141, 152
Poems by Amelia 97
Poe's Cottage at Ford-
ham 182
Portrait of Henry Tim-
rod, A 229
Prentice, George Denison. 57
Preston, Margaret 116
Procne's Revenge 21
Randall, James Ryder... 158
Raven, The 73
Red Eagle 88
Red Leaves and Roses... 224
Reese, Lizette Wood-
worth 228
Resignation 34
Revolutionary Period,
The . 07
266
INDEX.
PAGE.
Rich, R 17
Roll, Jordan, Roll 108
Rosa Lee 92
Russell, Irwin 19°
Russell's Magazine 152
Ryan, Abram Joseph.... 161
S
Sandys, George 20
Sapelo 189
Sass, George Herbert... 186
Savannah Freeman's Song.
no
Science of English Verse,
The 174
Sea Mark, The 19
Serenade, A 57
Shade of the Trees, The. 119
Shaw, John
Simms, William Gilmore.
61, 152
Sledd, Benjamin 223
Sleep and His Brother
Death 212
Smith, John 19
Snowden, Yates 216
Soldier Boy, The H5
Song 3°
Song in March 64
Song of the Chattahoo-
chee 174,
Song of the Mystic i6(
Songs and Poems of the
South &
Songs from Dixie Land.. 21,
Songs of Dusk and Dawn. 22
Songs of North and
South 22
PAGE.
onnet ................. T42
Sot-Weed Factors, The.. 25
Southrons, Hear Your
Country Qall You ..... 112
pirit and the Wood
Sparrow, The ......... 222
Stanton, Frank Lebby.... 213
Stanzas ................. 5°
Star - Spangled Banner,
The .................. 4i
Stars Begin to Fall ...... in
tockard, Henry Jerome. 215
Stoddard, Richard Henry. 142
Summer Bower, The.... 143
Sunrise ................. J74
Sunset on Hampton
Roads ................ 140
Swinburne, Algernon
Charles ............... 152
Swing Low, Sweet Char
iot ................... ion
Sword of Robert Lee,
The .................. 165
Tabb, John Banister ..... 185
Taylor, Bayard .......... 152
There'll Come a Day ---- 122
Thompson, John Reu
ben .................. 125
Thompson, Maurice ...... 191
Thompson, Will Henry.. 191
Three Summer Studies.. 137
Ticknor, Francis Orrery. 122
Tiger Lilies ............. 174
Timrod, Henry ....... 141, *52
To a Fair Lady ......... 43
To a Lily ............... J32
INDEX.
267
PAGE.
To Anne 43
To a Seashell 97
To My Daughter Lily... 92
To One in Paradise 79
To Spring 84
To the Mocking Bird.. 51, 82
Triumph of Hector, The. 36
Triumph of Music 224
Truth and Reason 94
Tucker, St. George 34
Twilight at Sea 97
U
Up from Georgia 213
Upon a Purple Cap 22
Vale of Tempe, The 224
Virginia Hearts of Oak.. 30
PAGE.
Virginians of the Valley. 124
Votive Song 56
W
Wallis, Severn Teackle.. 94
Warren's Last Words... 33
Watchers of the Hearth,
The 223
Welby, Amelia 97
Wharton, Charles Henry. 31
Whippoorwill, The 224
Whittier, John Greenleaf. 152
Wilde, Richard Henry.. 50
Wilson, Robert Burns, , , , 194
Yemassee, The 61
Youth and Age 45
Yule Log, The 212
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