Exhaustless wealth of crops,
In vast, magnificent extravagance.
These grand, exuberant plains,
These stately rivers, each with many a mouth,
The exquisite beauty of the soft-aired south,
The boundless seas of grains,
Luxuriant forests lush and splendid growth.
The distant siren-song
Of the green island in the eastern sea,
Is not the lay for this new chivalry.
It is not free and strong
To chant on prairies neath this brilliant sky.
The echo faints and fails;
It suiteth not, upon this western plain,
Our voice or spirit; we should stir again
The wilderness, and make the vales
Resound unto a yet unheard-of strain.
HEROES.
In rich Virginian woods,
The scarlet creeper reddens over graves,
Among the solemn trees enlooped with vines ;
Heroic spirits haunt the solitudes,
The noble souls of half a million braves,
Amid the murmurous pines.
