Derne

NIGHT on the city of the Moor!On mosque and tomb, and white-walled shore,On sea-waves, to whose ceaseless knockThe narrow harbor-gates unlock,On corsair's galley, carack tall,And plundered Christian caraval!The sounds of Moslem life are still;No mule-bell tinkles down the hill;Stretched in the broad court of the khan,The dusty Bornou caravanLies heaped in slumber, beast and man;The Sheik is dreaming in his tent,His noisy Arab tongue o'erspent;The kiosk's glimmering lights are gone,The merchant with his wares withdrawn;Rough pillowed on some pirate breast,The dancing-girl has sunk to rest;And, save where measured footsteps fallAlong the Bashaw's guarded wall,Or where, like some bad dream, the JewCreeps stealthily his quarter through,Or counts with fear his golden heaps,The City of the Corsair sleeps.

But where yon prison long and lowStands black against the pale star-glow,Chafed by the ceaseless wash of waves,There watch and pine the Christian slaves;Rough-bearded men, whose far-off wivesWear out with grief their lonely lives;And youth, still flashing from his eyesThe clear blue of New England skies,A treasured lock of whose soft hairNow wakes some sorrowing mother's prayer;Or, worn upon some maiden breast,Stirs with the loving heart's unrest.

A bitter cup each life must drain,The groaning earth is cursed with pain,And, like the scroll the angel boreThe shuddering Hebrew seer before,O'erwrit alike, without, within,With all the woes which follow sin;But, bitterest of the ills beneathWhose load man totters down to death,Is that which plucks the regal crownOf Freedom from his forehead down,And snatches from his powerless handThe sceptred sign of self-command,Effacing with the chain and rodThe image and the seal of God;Till from his nature, day by day,The manly virtues fall away,And leave him naked, blind and mute,The godlike merging in the brute!

Why mourn the quiet ones who dieBeneath affection's tender eye,Unto their household and their kinLike ripened corn-sheaves gathered in?O weeper, from that tranquil sod,That holy harvest-home of God,Turn to the quick and suffering, shedThy tears upon the living deadThank God above thy dear ones' graves,They sleep with Him, they are not slaves.

What dark mass, down the mountain-sidesSwift-pouring, like a stream divides?A long, loose, straggling caravan,Camel and horse and armed man.The moon's low crescent, glimmering o'erIts grave of waters to the shore,Lights tip that mountain cavalcade,And gleams from gun and spear and bladeNear and more near! now o'er them fallsThe shadow of the city walls.Hark to the sentry's challenge, drownedIn the fierce trumpet's charging sound!The rush of men, the musket's peal,The short, sharp clang of meeting steel!

Vain, Moslem, vain thy lifeblood pouredSo freely on thy foeman's sword!Not to the swift nor to the strongThe battles of the right belong;For he who strikes for Freedom wearsThe armor of the captive's prayers,And Nature proffers to his causeThe strength of her eternal laws;While he whose arm essays to bindAnd herd with common brutes his kindStrives evermore at fearful oddsWith Nature and the jealous gods,And dares the dread recoil which lateOr soon their right shall vindicate.

'T is done, the horned crescent fallsThe star-flag flouts the broken wallsJoy to the captive husband! joyTo thy sick heart, O brown-locked boy!In sullen wrath the conquered MoorWide open flings your dungeon-door,And leaves ye free from cell and chain,The owners of yourselves again.Dark as his allies desert-born,Soiled with the battle's stain, and wornWith the long marches of his bandThrough hottest wastes of rock and sand,Scorched by the sun and furnace-breathOf the red desert's wind of death,With welcome words and grasping hands,The victor and deliverer stands!

The tale is one of distant skies;The dust of half a century liesUpon it; yet its hero's nameStill lingers on the lips of Fame.Men speak the praise of him who gaveDeliverance to the Moorman's slave,Yet dare to brand with shame and crimeThe heroes of our land and time,--The self-forgetful ones, who stakeHome, name, and life for Freedom's sake.God mend his heart who cannot feelThe impulse of a holy zeal,And sees not, with his sordid eyes,The beauty of self-sacrificeThough in the sacred place he stands,Uplifting consecrated hands,Unworthy are his lips to tellOf Jesus' martyr-miracle,Or name aright that dread embraceOf suffering for a fallen race!