Page:What cheer, or, Roger Williams in banishment (1896).pdf/175

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LXVII.

"'Thou art to voyage an unexploréd flood,
  No chart is there thy lonely bark to steer;
Beneath her rocks, around her tempests rude,
  And persecution's billows in her rear,
Shall shake thy soul till it is near subdued;
  But when the welcome of Whatcheer! Whatcheer!
Shall greet thine ears from Indian multitude,
Cast thou the Anchor there, and trust in God.'


LXVIII.

He went away, and I could not detain
  Him from departing in the stormy night;
He would but promise to be seen again
  Where faith in freedom should my rest invite.
I've often dwelt on that prophetic strain,
  Recalled that voice,—and rightly can recite
The words it uttered.—Oh that I had more
Their import weighed, and shunned this tyrant shore!


LXIX.

"For, Mary, deem it not a sinful thought,
  That Heaven should give her counsels to restore
The soul to freedom.—Lo! what wonders wrought
  The God of Christians for the Church of yore;
With heathen darkness was the conscienee fraught,
  And tyrants chained it to a barbarous lore;
To break like thraldom in a Christian land,
Angels may speak, and God disclose his hand.


LXX.

"This spot I rashly chose. No Indian train
  Glad welcome gave to my enraptured ear,
And that mysterious form comes not again,
  Inspiring courage; therefore hence we steer,