A CHRISTIAN SLAVE. But wisely shut the ray Of God's free gospel, from the simple heart; So shalt thou deftly raise The market price of human flesh and while, Grave, reverend men shall tell From Northern pulpits how Thy work was blest, Oh shame! The Moslem thrall Who with his master, to the Prophet kneels, Cheers for the turbaned Bey Of robber-peopled Tunis! he hath torn But our poor slave in vain Turns to the Christian shrine his aching eyes-- God of all right! how long Shall priestly robbers at thine altar stand, 325 326 A CHRISTIAN SLAVE. Oh! from the fields of cane, From the low rice-swamps, from the trader's cell, Hoarse, horrible, and strong, How long! Oh God! How long! WHITTIER. WHEN George Fox thundered in the ears of Priest and Prelate the great truths of spiritual liberty: when the eloquence of the youthful and zealous Edward Burrough awed the very mob into silence, and smote on the ear of Cromwell, like the voice of an accusing conscience, calling him back to his first love of Truth when Penn and Barclay grappled with hoary error, alike regardless whether it was clothed in the majesty of perverted law or consecrated with the baptismal sanctions of a corrupt Priesthood, until the whole land shook-there were the conservators who exclaimed-"Let us have peace in our day." The time is, I trust, not far distant, when the slaveholder shall no longer regard the society of Friends as in any degree opposed to the Christian and well meant endeavours of the friends of emancipation: but that in every heart which beats for the suffering, whatever garb may cover it; in every prayer put up in sincerity to the Father of mercies for the deliverance of the captive, whether uttered in our own quiet gatherings, or mingling with the forms of another worship: in every voice of common humanity pleading for the down-trodden and oppressed whether speaking in the language of Woolman or of Clarkson-we may recognise our own precious testimony: and rejoice that the "little one has become a thousand, and that the seed sown in weakness by our worthy predecessors has been raised up in power." J. G. W. our FOR an Death of the Sagamore. account of William Wilson's Visit to his Death-bed, see "Thatcher's Indian Biography." THE servant of God is on his way, From Boston's beautiful shore- The purpose that fills his soul is great, The boat is fast-and over the sod, Where Romney's forest is high and dark, The Eagle lowers her wing, O'er him who once had made her his mark- Is a perishing, powerless king! At the door of his wigwam hangs the bow, While he who bore them is faint and low, With his eyeballs dim, and his breathing slow 328 THE DEATH OF THE SAGAMORE. The eye that glanced and the Eagle fled, The hand that drew and the deer was dead, But each his powerful work has done— And weeping, the mother hangs over her son, The "Queen of the Massachusetts" grieves, The stately form which is prostrate there, And oft, when roaming the wild alone, At the touch of a ray of light that shone From the white man's God, till before His throne, Almost has the Indian knelt! Yet the fatal fear, the fear of man, That bringeth to man a snare, To bend-and the thought of a heathen clan, Hath stifled a Christian's prayer. THE DEATH OF THE SAGAMORE. But now, like a flood to his trembling heart, And keener far than the icy dart, To the lonely spot where the Chief reclines, "Alas!" he cried-in the strange deep tone Of one in the grasp of death, "No God have I-I have lost my own, "The spirit that makes the skies so bright, Who rolls the waters, and kindles the light, "When Oh, if I openly had confessed, "But grant me the one great boon I crave, When I shall have sunk in my forest grave, 2R That beautiful forest flower. 329 |