The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 07, No. 43, May, 1861 Creator eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 310 pages of information about The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 07, No. 43, May, 1861 Creator.

The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 07, No. 43, May, 1861 Creator eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 310 pages of information about The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 07, No. 43, May, 1861 Creator.
we must prefer our requests to an Ear more ready to hear us and a Hand more ready to help.  It is not to Time that I shall apply to lead me through life into immortality!  And I cannot think of years to come without going back to a greater poet, whom we need not esteem the less because his inspiration was loftier than that of the Muses, who has summed up so grandly in one comprehensive sentence all the possibilities which could befall him in the days and ages before him.  “Thou shall guide me with Thy counsel, and afterward receive me to glory!” Let us humbly trust that in that sketch, round and complete, of all that can ever come to us, my readers and I may be able to read the history of our Future Years!

BROTHER JONATHAN’S LAMENT FOR SISTER CAROLINE.

  She has gone,—­she has left us in passion and pride,—­
  Our stormy-browed sister, so long at our side! 
  She has torn her own star from our firmament’s glow,
  And turned on her brother the face of a foe!

  O Caroline, Caroline, child of the sun,
  We can never forget that our hearts have been one,—­
  Our foreheads both sprinkled in Liberty’s name,
  From the fountain of blood with the finger of flame!

  You were always too ready to fire at a touch;
  But we said, “She is hasty,—­she does not mean much.” 
  We have scowled, when you uttered some turbulent threat;
  But Friendship still whispered, “Forgive and forget!”

  Has our love all died out?  Have its altars grown cold? 
  Has the curse come at last which the fathers foretold? 
  Then Nature must teach us the strength of the chain
  That her petulant children would sever in vain.

  They may fight till the buzzards are gorged with their spoil,
  Till the harvest grows black as it rots in the soil,
  Till the wolves and the catamounts troop from their caves,
  And the shark tracks the pirate, the lord of the waves: 

  In vain is the strife!  When its fury is past,
  Their fortunes must flow in one channel at last,
  As the torrents that rush from the mountains of snow
  Roll mingled in peace through the valleys below.

  Our Union is river, lake, ocean, and sky: 
  Man breaks not the medal, when God cuts the die! 
  Though darkened with sulphur, though cloven with steel,
  The blue arch will brighten, the waters will heal!

  O Caroline, Caroline, child of the sun,
  There are battles with Fate that can never be won! 
  The star-flowering banner must never be furled,
  For its blossoms of light are the hope of the world!

  Go, then, our rash sister! afar and aloof,—­
  Run wild in the sunshine away from our roof;
  But when your heart aches and your feet have grown sore,
  Remember the pathway that leads to our door!

ORIGINAL MEMORIALS OF MRS. PIOZZI.

Copyrights
Project Gutenberg
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 07, No. 43, May, 1861 Creator from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.