inhospitable rocks at this dismal season, where they are deserted, before long, by the ship which had brought them, and which seemed their only hold upon the world of fellowmen; a prey to the elements and to want, and fearfully ignorant of the numbers, the power, and the temper of the savage tribes that filled the unexplored continent upon whose verge they had ventured. But all this wrought together for good. These trials of wandering and exile, of the ocean, the winter, the wilderness, and the savage foe, were the final assurance of success. It was these that put far away from our fathers' cause all patrician softness, all hereditary claims to pre-eminence. No effeminate nobility crowded into the dark and austere ranks of the Pilgrims; no Carr or Villiers would lead on the ill-provided band of despised Puritans; no well-endowed clergy were on the alert to quit their cathedrals, and set up a pompous hierarchy in the frozen wilderness; no craving governors were anxious to be sent over to our cheerless El Dorados of ice and of snow. No. They could not say that they encouraged, patronized, or helped the pilgrims. Their own cares, their own labors, their own counsels, their own blood, contrived all, achieved all, bore all, sealed all. They could not afterward fairly pretend to reap where they had not sown; and, as our fathers reared this broad and solid fabric with pains and watchfulness, unaided, barely tolerated, it did not fall when the favor, which had always been withholden, was changed into wrath; when the arm, which had never supported, was raised to destroy. Methinks I see it now, that one solitary, adventurous vessel, the May-Flower of a forlorn hope, freighted with the prospects of a future state, and bound across the unknown sea. I behold it pursuing, with a thousand misgivings, the uncertain, the tedious voyage. Suns rise and set, and weeks and months pass, and winter surprises them on the deep, but brings them not in sight of the wished-for shore. I see them now, scantily supplied with provisions, crowded almost to suffocation in their ill-stored prison, delayed by calms, pursuing a circuitous route; and now driven in fury before the raging tempest, on the high and giddy waves. The awful voice of the storm howls through the rigging; the laboring masts seem straining from their base; the dismal sound of the pumps is heard; the ship leaps, as it were, madly, from billow to billow; the ocean breaks. and settles with ingulfing floods over the floating deck, and beats, with deadening, shivering weight, against the staggered vessel. I see them, escaped from these perils, pursuing their all but desperate undertaking, and landed, at last, after a few months' passage, on the ice-clad rocks of Plymouth; weak and weary from the voyage, poorly armed, scantily provisioned, depending on the charity of their ship-master for a draught of beer on board, drinking nothing but water on shore, without shelter, without means, surrounded by hostile tribes. Shut now the volume of history, and tell me, on any principle of human probability, what shall be the fate of this handful of adventurers. Tell me, man of military science, in how many months were they all swept off by the thirty savage tribes, enumerated within the early limits of New England? Tell me, politician, how long did this shadow of a colony, on which your conventions and treaties had not smiled, languish on the distant coast? Student of history, compare for me the baffled projects, the deserted settlements, the abandoned adventures of other times, and find the parallel of this. Was it the winter's storm, beating upon the houseless heads of women and children? was it hard labor and spare meals? was it disease? was it the tomahawk? was it the deep malady of a blighted hope, a ruined enterprise, and a broken heart, aching, in its last moments, at the recollection of the loved and left, beyond the sea? was it some, or all of these united, that hurried this forsaken company to their melancholy fate? And is it possible that none of these causes, that not all combined, were able to blast this bud of hope? Is it possible, that, from a beginning so feeble, so frail, so worthy, not so much of admiration as of pity, there has gone forth a progress so steady, a growth so wonderful, an expansion so ample, a reality so important, a promise, yet to be fulfilled, so glorious? E. EVERETT. 28 LESSON CLIII. LANDING OF THE PILGRIMS. THE breaking waves dashed high And the heavy night hung dark The hills and waters o'er, When a band of exiles moored their bark Not as the conqueror comes, They, the true-hearted, came, Not with the roll of the stirring drums, Not as the flying come, In silence and in fear; They shook the depths of the desert's glooin With their hymns of lofty cheer. Amid the storm they sang, And the stars heard, and the sea; And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang To the anthem of the free. The ocean eagle soared From his nest by the white wave's foam, And the rocking pines of the forest roared; This was their welcome home. There were men with hoary hair, Why had they come to wither there, Away from their childhood's land? There was woman's fearless eye, There was manhood's brow, serenely high, And the fiery heart of youth. What sought they thus afar? The wealth of seas, the spoils of war? Ay, call it holy ground, The soil where first they trod! They have left unstained what there they found, MRS. HEMANS. LESSON CLIV. THE VAUDOIS WIFE. [The wife of a Vaudois leader, in an attack made on one of their hamlets, received a mortal wound, and died in her husband's arms, exhorting him to courage and endurance.] THY Voice is in mine ear, beloved! Thy look is in my heart, Thy bosom is my resting-place, Earth on my soul is strong, too strong, All woven of thy love, dear friend, Thou seest mine eye grow dim, beloved! A little while between our hearts Alas! thy tears are on my cheek, My spirit they detain; I know that from thine agony Is wrung that burning rain. Best, kindest, weep not; make the pang, The bitter conflict, less; Oh! sad it is, and yet a joy, To feel thy love's excess. But calm thee! Let the thought of death The voice that must be silent soon, Even from this hour of strife. I bless thee for the noble heart, Where mine hath found the happiest rest, I bless thee for kind looks and words For the voice which ne'er to mine replied I bless thee for the last, rich boon The right to gaze on death with thee, And yet more for the glorious hope Even to these moments given; Did not thy spirit ever lift The trust of mine to Heaven? Now be thou strong! Oh! knew we not Our path must lead to this? A shadow and a trembling still Were mingled with our bliss. We plighted our young hearts, when storms In full, deep knowledge of their task, |