“But thou art too lovely and precious a gem
To be bound to their burdens and sullied by them—­
For shame, Ellen, shame!—­cast thy bondage aside,
And away to the South, as my blessing and pride.

“O, come where no winter thy footsteps can wrong,
But where flowers are blossoming all the year long,
Where the shade of the palm-tree is over my home,
And the lemon and orange are white in their bloom!

“O, come to my home, where my servants shall all
Depart at thy bidding and come at thy call;
They shall heed thee as mistress with trembling and awe,
And each wish of thy heart shall be felt as a law.”

O, could ye have seen her—­that pride of our girls—­
Arise and cast back the dark wealth of her curls,
With a scorn in her eye which the gazer could feel,
And a glance like the sunshine that flashes on steel: 

“Go back, haughty Southron! thy treasures of gold
Are dim with the blood of the hearts thou hast sold! 
Thy home may be lovely, but round it I hear
The crack of the whip and the footsteps of fear!

“And the sky of thy South may be brighter than ours,
And greener thy landscapes, and fairer thy flowers;
But, dearer the blast round our mountains which raves,
Than the sweet sunny zephyr which breathes over slaves!

“Full low at thy bidding thy negroes may kneel,
With the iron of bondage on spirit and heel;
Yet know that the Yankee girl sooner would be
In fetters with them, than in freedom with thee!”

From Tait’s Edinburgh Magazine.

JEFFERSON’S DAUGHTER.

“It is asserted, on the authority of an American Newspaper, that the daughter of Thomas Jefferson, late President of the United States, was sold at New Orleans for $1,000.”—­Morning Chronicle.

Can the blood that, at Lexington, poured o’er the plain,
  When the sons warred with tyrants their rights to uphold,
Can the tide of Niagara wipe out the stain? 
  No!  Jefferson’s child has been bartered for gold!

Do you boast of your freedom?  Peace, babblers—­be still;
  Prate not of the goddess who scarce deigns to hear;
Have ye power to unbind?  Are ye wanting in will? 
  Must the groans of your bondman still torture the ear?

The daughter of Jefferson sold for a slave! 
  The child of a freeman for dollars and francs! 
The roar of applause, when your orators rave,
  Is lost in the sound of her chain, as it clanks.

Peace, then, ye blasphemers of Liberty’s name! 
  Though red was the blood by your forefathers spilt,
Still redder your cheeks should be mantled with shame,
  Till the spirit of freedom shall cancel the guilt.

But the brand of the slave is the tint of his skin,
  Though his heart may beat loyal and true underneath;
While the soul of the tyrant is rotten within,
  And his white the mere cloak to the blackness of death.