The land he saved, the empire of the free— Thy broad and steadfast throne, triumphant Liberty!
THE JERSEY PRISON-SHIP.
BY JOHN W. WHITMAN.
THEY died! the young, the loved, the brave:
The death-barge came for them;
And where the seas yon crag-rocks lave
Their nightly requiem,
They buried them all, and threw the sand,
Unhallow'dly, o'er that patriot band.
The black-ship, like a demon, sate
Upon the prowling deep:
From her came fearful sounds of hate,
Till pain still'd all in sleep.
It was the sleep that victims take,
Tied, tortured, dying at the stake.
Yet some the deep has now updug,
Their bones are in the sun;
And whether by sword, or deadly drug,
They died-yes, one by one.
Was it not strange to mortal eye,
To see them all so strangely die?
No death upon the field was theirs,
No war-peal o'er their graves:
They who were born as Freedom's heirs,
Were stabb'd like traitor slaves.
Their patriot hearts were doom'd to feel
Dishonour-with the victor's steel.
There come upon the stilly eve
Wild songs from yon wild shore:
And then the surges more wildly heave
Their hoarse and growling roar,
When dead men sing unearthly glees,
And shout in laughing revelries.
The corpse-light shines, like some pale star,
From out the dead men's cliff;
And the sea-nymphs sail in their coral car,
With those that are cold and stiff.
And they sail near the spot of treachery, where
The tide has left the dark ship bare.
Are they those ancient ones who died
For freedom, and for me?
They are they point, in martyr'd pride,
To that spot, upon the sea,
From whence came once the dying yell,
From out that wreck-that prison'd hell.
Hark! hear their chant! it starts the hair-
It makes the blood turn cold-
'Twould make the tiger leave his lair-
The miser quit his gold.
And, see! yon harper, he doth try
A dead man's note of melody.
Soundly sleep we in the day,
And yet we trip it nightly;
We sail with the nymphs around each bay When the moon peers out most brightly. And we chase our foes to their distant graves; For they, like us, are sleeping;
But they dare not come o'er our bonny waves,
For our nightly watch we're keeping.
Our spectres visit their foreign homes,
And pluck, right merrily,
Their bones, which whiten within their tombs,
And plant them here-ay! cheerily :
For cheerily then we dance and sing,
With our spectre-band around them,
And the curse and the laugh of scorn we fling,
As we tell where our shadows found them.
And then we go to the rotting wreck,
Where we drank the cup of poison:
We laugh and we quaff upon her deck,
Till morn comes up the horizon.
But skip ye, skip ye, beneath the cliff,
For the sun comes up like a fiery skiff,
Ploughing the waves of yon blue sky-
Hie! laughing spectres! to your homes, haste! hie!
250 CONFLAGRATION OF WASHINGTON.
August 24, 1814.-By PHILIP FRENEAU.
Jam deiphobi debit ampla ruinam,
Vulcano superante, domus; jam proximus ardet
Ucalegon.-VIRGIL.
Now, George the Third rules not alone,
For George the Vandal shares the throne,
True flesh of flesh, and bone of bone.
God save us from the fangs of both;
Or, one a Vandal, one a Goth,
May roast or broil us into froth.
Like Danes, of old, their fleet they man,
And rove from Beersheba to Dan,
To burn, and beard us-where they can.
They say, at George the Fourth's command,
This vagrant host were sent, to land
And leave in every house a brand.
An idiot only would require
Such war-the worst they could desire-
The felon's war-the war of fire.
The warfare, now, the invaders make,
Must surely keep us all awake,
Or life is lost for freedom's sake.
They said to Cockburn, "honest Cock!
To make a noise and give a shock,
Push off, and burn their navy-dock :
"Their capitol shall be emblazed!
How will the buckskins stand amazed,
And curse the day its walls were raised!"
Six thousand heroes disembark:
Each left at night his floating ark,
And Washington was made their mark.
That few would fight them-few or none-
Was by their leaders clearly shown,
And, "Down," they said, "with Madison!"
How close they crept along the shore !
As closely as if Rodgers saw her-
A frigate to a seventy-four.
A veteran host, by veterans led,
With Ross and Cockburn at their head,
They came-they saw-they burn'd-and fled.
But not unpunish'd they retired;
They something paid, for all they fired,
In soldiers kill'd, and chiefs expired.
Five hundred veterans bit the dust,
Who came, inflamed with lucre's lust-
And so they waste-and so they must.
They left our Congress naked walls
Farewell to towers and capitols!
To lofty roofs and splendid halls!
To courtly domes and glittering things,
To folly, that too near us clings,
To courtiers who 'tis well-had wings.
Farewell to all but glorious war,
Which yet shall guard Potomac's shore,
And honour lost, and fame restore.
To conquer armies in the field,
Was, once, the surest method held
To make a hostile country yield.
The mode is this, now acted on:
In conflagrating Washington,
They held our independence gone!
Supposing George's house at Kew
Were burn'd, (as we intend to do,)
Would that be burning England too?
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