Page:Scenes in my Native Land.pdf/95

Are sweetly on our lips, at close of day,
At lamp-light, by the hearth-stone. Unforgot
Shalt thou remain, for the sweet germs of song
Do flourish, when the gauds of wealth and pomp
Sink in oblivion.
                           Lo! the risen sun
Stays not his course, but o'er the horizon sends
The Maker's message. On he goes, to wake
The self-same joys and sorrows, that have trod
Beside him, from Creation. In his track
Spring up the chronicles of days that were,
And legends, that the hoary-headed keep
In memory's treasure-house, when pitiless war
And Arnold's treason, woke the fires that made
A people homeless. See, on yonder spot,
Where the white column marks the buried brave,
Came the poor widow, and the orphan band,
Searching mid piles of carnage, for the forms
More dear than life.
                               But sure, yon kingly orb,
Mid all the zones through which his chariot rolls,
Beholds no realm more favored than our own,
Here, in this broad green West. So may he find
Hands knit in brotherhood, and hearts inspired
With love to Him, from whom all blessings flow.