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Poets of the South

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A FAREWELL TO AMERICA [4]

Farewell, my more than fatherland![5]
Home of my heart and friends, adieu!
Lingering beside some foreign strand,
How oft shall I remember you!
How often, o'er the waters blue,
Send back a sigh to those I leave,
The loving and beloved few,
Who grieve for me,--for whom I grieve!

We part!--no matter how we part,
There are some thoughts we utter not,
Deep treasured in our inmost heart,
Never revealed, and ne'er forgot!
Why murmur at the common lot?
We part!--I speak not of the pain,--
But when shall I each lovely spot,
And each loved face behold again?
It must be months,--it may be years,--[6]
It may--but no!--I will not fill
Fond hearts with gloom,--fond eyes with tears,
"Curious to shape uncertain ill."
Though humble,--few and far,--yet, still
Those hearts and eyes are ever dear;
Theirs is the love no time can chill,
The truth no chance or change can sear!

All I have seen, and all I see,
Only endears them more and more;
Friends cool, hopes fade, and hours flee,
Affection lives when all is o'er!
Farewell, my more than native shore!
I do not seek or hope to find,
Roam where I will, what I deplore
To leave with them and thee behind!

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Wilde, page 13. This song was translated into
Greek by Anthony Barclay and announced as a newly discovered ode by
Alcaeus. The trick, however, was soon detected by scholars, and the
author of the poem received a due meed of praise.]

[Footnote 2: The brevity of life has been a favorite theme of poets ever
since Job (vii. 6) declared, "Our days are swifter than a weaver's
shuttle."]

[Footnote 3: The reference seems to be to the shore about the Bay of
Tampa on the west coast of Florida.]

[Footnote 4: See page 13.]

[Footnote 5: It will be remembered that the poet was a native of
Ireland.]

[Footnote 6: The years 1834-1840 were spent in Europe, chiefly in Italy.

Compare with this Byron's farewell to England, in Canto I of _Childe
Harold_.]



* * * * *


SELECTION FROM GEORGE D. PRENTICE

THE CLOSING YEAR [1]

'Tis midnight's holy hour, and silence now
Is brooding like a gentle spirit o'er
The still and pulseless world. Hark! on the winds
The bell's deep tones are swelling,--'tis the knell
Of the departed year.

No funeral train
Is sweeping past; yet on the stream and wood,
With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest
Like a pale, spotless shroud; the air is stirred,
As by a mourner's sigh; and on yon cloud
That floats so still and placidly through heaven,
The spirits of the seasons seem to stand--
Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn form,
And Winter with his aged locks--and breathe,
In mournful cadences that come abroad
Like the far wind-harp's wild and touching wail,
A melancholy dirge o'er the dead year,
Gone from the earth forever.

'Tis a time
For memory and for tears. Within the deep,
Still chambers of the heart a specter dim,
Whose tones are like the wizard voice of Time,
Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold
And solemn finger to the beautiful
And holy visions that have passed away,
And left no shadow of their loveliness
On the dead waste of life. That specter lifts
The coffin lid of Hope, and Joy, and Love,
And, bending mournfully above the pale,
Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead flowers
O'er what has passed to nothingness.

The year
Has gone, and with it many a glorious throng
Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow,
Its shadow in each heart. In its swift course
It waved its scepter o'er the beautiful,--
And they are not. It laid its pallid hand
Upon the strong man,--and the haughty form
Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim.
It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged
The bright and joyous, and the tearful wail
Of stricken ones is heard, where erst the song
And reckless shout resounded. It passed o'er
The battle plain, where sword, and spear, and shield
Flashed in the light of midday--and the strength
Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass,
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above
The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came
And faded like a wreath of mist at eve;
Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air,
It heralded its millions to their home
In the dim land of dreams.

Remorseless Time!
Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe!--what power
Can stay him in his silent course, or melt
His iron heart to pity? On, still on
He presses, and forever. The proud bird,
The condor of the Andes, that can soar
Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave
The fury of the northern hurricane,
And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,
Furls his broad wings at nightfall and sinks down
To rest upon his mountain crag--but Time
Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness,
And night's deep darkness has no chain to bind
His rushing pinions. Revolutions sweep
O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast
Of dreaming sorrow,--cities rise and sink
Like bubbles on the water,--fiery isles
Spring blazing from the ocean, and go back
To their mysterious caverns,--mountains rear
To heaven their bald and blackened cliffs, and bow
Their tall heads to the plain,--new empires rise,
Gathering the strength of hoary centuries,
And rush down like the Alpine avalanche,
Startling the nations,--and the very stars,
Yon bright and burning blazonry of God,
Glitter a while in their eternal depths,
And, like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train,
Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away [2]
To darkle in the trackless void,--yet Time,
Time, the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career,
Dark, stern, all-pitiless, and pauses not
Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path
To sit and muse, like other conquerors,
Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought.

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Prentice, page 14. The flight of time is
another favorite theme with poets. _The Closing Year_ should be
compared with Bryant's _The Flood of Years_; similar in theme, the
two poems have much in common. The closing lines of Bryant's poem express
a sweet faith that relieves the somber tone of the preceding
reflections:--

"In the room
Of this grief-shadowed present, there shall be
A Present in whose reign no grief shall gnaw
The heart, and never shall a tender tie
Be broken; in whose reign the eternal Change
That waits on growth and action shall proceed
With everlasting Concord hand in hand."]

[Footnote 2. This is a reference to the belief that one of the seven
stars originally supposed to form the Pleiades has disappeared. Such a
phenomenon is not unknown; modern astronomers record several such
disappearances. See Simms's _The Lost Pleiad_, following.]



* * * * *


SELECTIONS FROM WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS

THE LOST PLEIAD [1]

Not in the sky,
Where it was seen
So long in eminence of light serene,--
Nor on the white tops of the glistering wave,
Nor down in mansions of the hidden deep,
Though beautiful in green
And crystal, its great caves of mystery,--
Shall the bright watcher have
Her place, and, as of old, high station keep!

Gone! gone!
Oh! nevermore, to cheer
The mariner, who holds his course alone
On the Atlantic, through the weary night,
When the stars turn to watchers, and do sleep,
Shall it again appear,
With the sweet-loving certainty of light,
Down shining on the shut eyes of the deep!

The upward-looking shepherd on the hills
Of Chaldea, night-returning with his flocks,
He wonders why her beauty doth not blaze,
Gladding his gaze,--
And, from his dreary watch along the rocks,
Guiding him homeward o'er the perilous ways!
How stands he waiting still, in a sad maze,
Much wondering, while the drowsy silence fills
The sorrowful vault!--how lingers, in the hope that night
May yet renew the expected and sweet light,
So natural to his sight! [2]

And lone,
Where, at the first, in smiling love she shone,
Brood the once happy circle of bright stars:
How should they dream, until her fate was known,
That they were ever confiscate to death? [3]
That dark oblivion the pure beauty mars,
And, like the earth, its common bloom and breath,
That they should fall from high;
Their lights grow blasted by a touch, and die,
All their concerted springs of harmony
Snapt rudely, and the generous music gone![4]

Ah! still the strain
Of wailing sweetness fills the saddening sky;
The sister stars, lamenting in their pain
That one of the selected ones must die,--
Must vanish, when most lovely, from the rest!
Alas! 'tis ever thus the destiny.
Even Rapture's song hath evermore a tone
Of wailing, as for bliss too quickly gone.
The hope most precious is the soonest lost,
The flower most sweet is first to feel the frost.
Are not all short-lived things the loveliest?
And, like the pale star, shooting down the sky,
Look they not ever brightest, as they fly
From the lone sphere they blest!



THE SWAMP FOX [5]
We follow where the Swamp Fox guides,
His friends and merry men are we;
And when the troop of Tarleton [6] rides,
We burrow in the cypress tree.
The turfy hammock is our bed,
Our home is in the red deer's den,
Our roof, the tree-top overhead,
For we are wild and hunted men.

We fly by day and shun its light,
But, prompt to strike the sudden blow,
We mount and start with early night,
And through the forest track our foe.[7]
And soon he hears our chargers leap,
The flashing saber blinds his eyes,
And ere he drives away his sleep,
And rushes from his camp, he dies.

Free bridle bit, good gallant steed,
That will not ask a kind caress
To swim the Santee [8] at our need,
When on his heels the foemen press,--
The true heart and the ready hand,
The spirit stubborn to be free,
The twisted bore, the smiting brand,--
And we are Marion's men, you see.

Now light the fire and cook the meal,
The last, perhaps, that we shall taste;
I hear the Swamp Fox round us steal,
And that's a sign we move in haste.
He whistles to the scouts, and hark!
You hear his order calm and low.
Come, wave your torch across the dark,
And let us see the boys that go.

We may not see their forms again,
God help 'em, should they find the strife!
For they are strong and fearless men,
And make no coward terms for life;
They'll fight as long as Marion bids,
And when he speaks the word to shy,
Then, not till then, they turn their steeds,
Through thickening shade and swamp to fly.

Now stir the fire and lie at ease,--
The scouts are gone, and on the brush
I see the Colonel [9] bend his knees,
To take his slumbers too. But hush!
He's praying, comrades; 'tis not strange;
The man that's fighting day by day
May well, when night comes, take a change,
And down upon his knees to pray.

Break up that hoecake, boys, and hand
The sly and silent jug that's there;
I love not it should idly stand
When Marion's men have need of cheer.
'Tis seldom that our luck affords
A stuff like this we just have quaffed,
And dry potatoes on our boards
May always call for such a draught.

Now pile the brush and roll the log;
Hard pillow, but a soldier's head
That's half the time in brake and bog
Must never think of softer bed.
The owl is hooting to the night,
The cooter [10] crawling o'er the bank,
And in that pond the flashing light
Tells where the alligator sank.

What! 'tis the signal! start so soon,
And through the Santee swamp so deep,
Without the aid of friendly moon,
And we, Heaven help us! half asleep!
But courage, comrades! Marion leads,
The Swamp Fox takes us out to-night;
So clear your swords and spur your steeds,
There's goodly chance, I think, of fight.

We follow where the Swamp Fox guides,
We leave the swamp and cypress tree,
Our spurs are in our coursers' sides,
And ready for the strife are we.
The Tory camp is now in sight,
And there he cowers within his den;
He hears our shouts, he dreads the fight,
He fears, and flies from Marion's men.

[Footnote 1: See note above. There is a peculiar fitness in the reference
to the sea in this poem; for the constellation of the Pleiades was named
by the Greeks from their word _plein_, to sail, because the
Mediterranean was navigable with safety during the months these stars
were visible.]

[Footnote 2: The poet seems to associate the Chaldean shepherd with the
Magi, who, as astrologers, observed the stars with profound interest. The
hope expressed for the return of the star cannot be regarded, in the
light of modern astronomy, as entirely fanciful. Only recently a new star
has flamed forth in the constellation Perseus.]

[Footnote 3: The fixed stars, continually giving forth immeasurable
quantities of heat, are in a process of cooling. Sooner or later they
will become dark bodies. Astronomers tell us that there is reason to
believe that the dark bodies or burned-out suns of the universe are more
numerous than the bright ones, though the number of the latter exceeds
125 millions. The existence of such dark bodies has been established
beyond a reasonable doubt.]

[Footnote 4: A reference to the old belief that the stars make music in
their courses. In Job (xxxviii. 7) we read: "When the morning stars sang
together." According to the Platonic philosophy, this music of the
spheres, too faint for mortal ears, was heard only by the gods.
Shakespeare has given beautiful expression to this belief:--

"There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st
But in his motion like an angel sings,
Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins;
Such harmony is in immortal souls;
But whilst this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it."
--_Merchant of Venice_, Act V., Sc. 1.]

[Footnote 5: See sketch of Simms, page 16. This poem is found in _The
Partisan_, the first of three novels descriptive of the Revolution.
Read a biographical sketch of General Francis Marion (1732-1795), whose
shrewdness in attack and escape earned for him the _sobriquet_
"Swamp Fox."]

[Footnote 6: Sir Banastre Tarleton (1754-1833) was a lieutenant colonel
in the army of Cornwallis. He was a brilliant and successful officer, but
was defeated by General Morgan in the battle of Cowpens in 1781.]

[Footnote 7: "Sumter, Marion, and other South Carolina leaders found
places of refuge in the great swamps which are found in parts of the
state; and from these they kept up an active warfare with the British.
Their desperate battles, night marches, surprises, and hairbreadth
escapes make this the most exciting and interesting period of the
Revolution."--Johnston's _History of the United States_.]

[Footnote 8: Marion's principal field of operations lay between the
Santee and Pedee rivers.]

[Footnote 9: Marion held the rank of captain at the outbreak of the
Revolution, and was made lieutenant colonel for gallant conduct in the
defence of Fort Moultrie, June 28, 1776. Later he was made general.]

[Footnote 10: A water tortoise or snapping turtle.]

Compare Bryant's _Song of Marion's Men_.



* * * * *


SELECTIONS FROM EDWARD COATE PINKNEY

A HEALTH [1]

I fill this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon;
To whom the better elements
And kindly stars have given
A form so fair, that, like the air,
'Tis less of earth than heaven.

Her every tone is music's own,
Like those of morning birds,
And something more than melody
Dwells ever in her words;
The coinage of her heart are they,
And from her lips each flows
As one may see the burdened bee
Forth issue from the rose.

Affections are as thoughts to her,[2]
The measures of her hours;
Her feelings have the fragrancy,
The freshness of young flowers;
And lovely passions, changing oft,
So fill her, she appears
The image of themselves by turns,--
The idol of past years!

Of her bright face one glance will trace
A picture on the brain,
And of her voice in echoing hearts
A sound must long remain;
But memory, such as mine of her,
So very much endears,
When death is nigh my latest sigh
Will not be life's, but hers.

I fill this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon--
Her health! and would on earth there stood
Some more of such a frame,
That life might be all poetry,
And weariness a name. [3]



SONG


We break the glass, whose sacred wine
To some beloved health we drain,
Lest future pledges, less divine,
Should e'er the hallowed toy profane;
And thus I broke a heart that poured
Its tide of feelings out for thee,
In draught, by after-times deplored,
Yet dear to memory.

But still the old, impassioned ways
And habits of my mind remain,
And still unhappy light displays
Thine image chambered in my brain;
And still it looks as when the hours
Went by like flights of singing birds,[4]
Or that soft chain of spoken flowers
and airy gems,--thy words.



VOTIVE SONG


I burn no incense, hang no wreath,
On this thine early tomb:
Such can not cheer the place of death,
But only mock its gloom.
Here odorous smoke and breathing flower
No grateful influence shed;
They lose their perfume and their power,
When offered to the dead.

And if, as is the Afghaun's creed,
The spirit may return,
A disembodied sense to feed
On fragrance, near its urn,--
It is enough that she, whom thou
Didst love in living years,
Sits desolate beside it now,
And fall these heavy tears.

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Pinkney, page 18. The flowing or lilting
melody of this and the following songs is quite remarkable. It is
traceable to the skillful use of liquid consonants and short vowels, and
the avoidance of harsh consonant combinations.]

[Footnote 2: The irregularities of this stanza are remarkable. The middle
rhyme used in the first and seventh lines of the other stanzas is here
lacking. It seems to have been an oversight on the part of the poet.]

[Footnote 3: With this drinking song we may compare the well-known one of
Ben Jonson:--

"Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup,
And I'll not look for wine.
The thirst that from the soul doth rise
Doth ask a drink divine;
But might I of Jove's nectar sup,
I would not change for thine.

"I sent thee late a rosy wreath,
Not so much honoring thee
As giving it a hope that there
It could not withered be;
But thou thereon didst only breathe
And sent'st it back to me;
Since when it grows, and smells, I swear,
Not of itself, but thee."]

[Footnote 4: This same simile occurs in a beautiful poem by Amelia C.
Welby (1819-1852), a Southern poet of no mean gifts, entitled _Twilight
at Sea_:--

"The twilight hours like birds flew by,
As lightly and as free;
Ten thousand stars were in the sky,
Ten thousand on the sea;
For every wave with dimpled face,
That leaped upon the air,
Had caught a star in its embrace,
And held it trembling there."]



* * * * *


SELECTION FROM PHILIP PENDLETON COOKE

FLORENCE VANE [1]

I loved thee long and dearly,
Florence Vane;
My life's bright dream, and early,
Hath come again;
I renew, in my fond vision,
My heart's dear pain;
My hope, and thy derision,
Florence Vane.

The ruin lone and hoary,
The ruin old,
Where thou didst hark my story,
At even told,--
That spot--the hues Elysian
Of sky and plain--
I treasure in my vision,
Florence Vane.

Thou wast lovelier than the roses
In their prime;
Thy voice excelled the closes
Of sweetest rhyme;
Thy heart was as a river
Without a main. [2]
Would I had loved thee never,
Florence Vane.

But fairest, coldest wonder!
Thy glorious clay
Lieth the green sod under--
Alas the day!
And it boots not to remember
Thy disdain--
To quicken love's pale ember,
Florence Vane.

The lilies of the valley
By young graves weep,
The pansies love to dally
Where maidens sleep;
May their bloom, in beauty vying,
Never wane,
Where thine earthly part is lying,
Florence Vane!

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Cooke, page 19. In the preface to the volume
from which this poem is taken, the author tells us that _Florence Vane
and Rosalie Lee_, another brief lyric, had "met with more favor than I
could ever perceive their just claim to." Hence he was kept from
"venturing upon the correction of some faults." _Rosalie Lee_ is
more than usually defective in meter and rhyme, but Florence Vane cannot
easily be improved.]

[Footnote 2: "My meaning, I suppose," the poet wrote an inquiring friend,
"was that Florence did not want the capacity to love, but directed her
love to no object. Her passions went flowing like a lost river. Byron has
a kindred idea expressed by the same figure. Perhaps his verses were in
my mind when I wrote my own:--

'She was the ocean to the river of his thoughts,
Which terminated all.'--_The Dream_.

But no verse ought to require to be interpreted, and if I were composing
Florence Vane now, I would avoid the over concentrated expression in the
two lines, and make the idea clearer."--_Southern Literary
Messenger_, 1850, p. 370.]



* * * * *


SELECTION FROM THEODORE O'HARA

THE BIVOUAC OF THE DEAD [1]

The muffled drum's sad roll has beat
The soldier's last tattoo:
No more op Life's parade shall meet
That brave and fallen few.
On Fame's eternal camping-ground
Their silent tents are spread,
And Glory guards, with solemn round,
The bivouac of the dead.

No rumor of the foe's advance
Now swells upon the wind;
No troubled thought at midnight haunts
Of loved ones left behind;
No vision of the morrow's strife
The warrior's dream alarms;
No braying horn nor screaming fife
At dawn shall call to arms.

Their shivered swords are red with rust,
Their plumed heads are bowed;
Their haughty banner, trailed in dust,
Is now their martial shroud.
And plenteous funeral tears have washed
The red stains from each brow,
And the proud forms, by battle gashed,
Are free from anguish now.

The neighboring troop, the flashing blade,
The bugle's stirring blast,
The charge, the dreadful cannonade,
The din and shout, are past;
Nor war's wild note nor glory's peal
Shall thrill with fierce delight
Those breasts that nevermore may feel
The rapture of the fight.

Like the fierce northern hurricane
That sweeps his great plateau,
Flushed with the triumph yet to gain,
Came down the serried foe. [2]
Who heard the thunder of the fray
Break o'er the field beneath,
Knew well the watchword of that day
Was "Victory or Death."

Long had the doubtful conflict raged
O'er all that stricken plain,
For never fiercer fight had waged
The vengeful blood of Spain; [3]
And still the storm of battle blew,
Still swelled the gory tide;
Not long, our stout old chieftain knew,
Such odds his strength could bide.

'Twas in that hour his stern command
Called to a martyr's grave
The flower of his beloved land,
The nation's flag to save.
By rivers of their fathers' gore
His first-born laurels grew, [4]
And well he deemed the sons would pour
Their lives for glory too.

Full many a norther's breath has swept
O'er Angostura's plain, [5]
And long the pitying sky has wept
Above its moldered slain.
The raven's scream, or eagle's flight,
Or shepherd's pensive lay,
Alone awakes each sullen height
That frowned o'er that dread fray.

Sons of the Dark and Bloody Ground,
Ye must not slumber there,
Where stranger steps and tongues resound
Along the heedless air.
Your own proud land's heroic soil
Shall be your fitter grave:
She claims from war his richest spoil--
The ashes of her brave.

Thus 'neath their parent turf they rest,
Far from the gory field,
Borne to a Spartan mother's breast
On many a bloody shield; [6]
The sunshine of their native sky
Smiles sadly on them here,
And kindred eyes and hearts watch by
The heroes' sepulcher.

Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead!
Dear as the blood ye gave;
No impious footstep here shall tread
The herbage of your grave;
Nor shall your glory be forgot
While Fame her record keeps,
Or Honor points the hallowed spot
Where valor proudly sleeps.

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