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(From The Pennsylvania Pilgrim)
NEVER in tenderer quiet lapsed the day | |
| From Pennsylvania’s vales of spring away, | |
| Where, forest-walled, the scattered hamlets lay | |
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| Along the wedded rivers. One long bar | |
| Of purple cloud, on which the evening star | 5 |
| Shone like a jewel on a scimitar, | |
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| Held the sky’s golden gateway. Through the deep | |
| Hush of the woods a murmur seemed to creep, | |
| The Schuylkill whispering in a voice of sleep. | |
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| All else was still. The oxen from their ploughs | 10 |
| Rested at last, and from their long day’s browse | |
| Came the dun files of Krisheim’s home-bound cows. | |
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| And the young city, round whose virgin zone | |
| The rivers like two mighty arms were thrown, | |
| Marked by the smoke of evening fires alone, | 15 |
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| Lay in the distance, lovely even then | |
| With its fair women and its stately men | |
| Gracing the forest court of William Penn, | |
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| Urban yet sylvan; in its rough-hewn frames | |
| Of oak and pine the dryads held their claims, | 20 |
| And lent its streets their pleasant woodland names. * * * * * | |
| Was it caressing air, the brooding love | |
| Of tenderer skies than German land knew of, | |
| Green calm below, blue quietness above, | |
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| Still flow of water, deep repose of wood | 25 |
| That, with a sense of loving Fatherhood | |
| And childlike trust in the Eternal Good, | |
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| Softened all hearts, and dulled the edge of hate, | |
| Hushed strife, and taught impatient zeal to wait | |
| The slow assurance of the better state? | 30 |
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| Who knows what goadings in their sterner way | |
| O’er jagged ice, relieved by granite gray, | |
| Blew round the men of Massachusetts Bay? | |
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| What hate of heresy the east-wind woke? | |
| What hints of pitiless power and terror spoke | 35 |
| In waves that on their iron coast-line broke? | |
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| Be it as it may; within the Land of Penn | |
| The sectary yielded to the citizen, | |
| And peaceful dwelt the many-creeded men. | |
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| Peace brooded over all. No trumpet stung | 40 |
| The air to madness, and no steeple flung | |
| Alarums down from bells at midnight rung. | |
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| The land slept well. The Indian from his face | |
| Washed all his war-paint off, and in the place | |
| Of battle-marches sped the peaceful chase, | 45 |
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| Or wrought for wages at the white man’s side,— | |
| Giving to kindness what his native pride | |
| And lazy freedom to all else denied. | |
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| And well the curious scholar loved the old | |
| Traditions that his swarthy neighbors told | 50 |
| By wigwam-fires when nights were growing cold, | |
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| Discerned the fact round which their fancy drew | |
| Its dreams, and held their childish faith more true | |
| To God and man than half the creeds he knew. | |
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| The desert blossomed round him; wheat-fields rolled, | 55 |
| Beneath the warm wind, waves of green and gold; | |
| The planted ear returned its hundredfold. | |
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| Great clusters ripened in a warmer sun | |
| Than that which by the Rhine stream shines upon | |
| The purpling hillsides with low vines o’errun. | 60 |
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| About each rustic porch the humming-bird | |
| Tried with light bill, that scarce a petal stirred, | |
| The Old World flowers to virgin soil transferred; | |
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| And the first-fruits of pear and apple, bending | |
| The young boughs down, their gold and russet blending, | 65 |
| Made glad his heart, familiar odors lending | |
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| To the fresh fragrance of the birch and pine, | |
| Life-everlasting, bay, and eglantine, | |
| And all the subtle scents the woods combine. | |
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| Fair First-Day mornings, steeped in summer calm | 70 |
| Warm, tender, restful, sweet with woodland balm, | |
| Came to him, like some mother-hallowed psalm | |
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| To the tired grinder at the noisy wheel | |
| Of labor, winding off from memory’s reel | |
| A golden thread of music. With no peal | 75 |
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| Of bells to call them to the house of praise, | |
| The scattered settlers through green forest-ways | |
| Walked meeting-ward. In reverent amaze | |
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| The Indian trapper saw them, from the dim | |
| Shade of the alders on the rivulet’s rim, | 80 |
| Seek the Great Spirit’s house to talk with Him. | |
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| There, through the gathered stillness multiplied | |
| And made intense by sympathy, outside | |
| The sparrows sang, and the gold-robin cried, | |
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| A-swing upon his elm. A faint perfume | 85 |
| Breathed through the open windows of the room | |
| From locust-trees, heavy with clustered bloom. | |
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| Thither, perchance, sore-tried confessors came, | |
| Whose fervor jail nor pillory could tame, | |
| Proud of the cropped ears meant to be their shame,— | 90 |
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| Men who had eaten slavery’s bitter bread | |
| In Indian isles; pale women who had bled | |
| Under the hangman’s lash, and bravely said | |
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| God’s message through their prison’s iron bars; | |
| And gray old soldier-converts, seamed with scars | 95 |
| From every stricken field of England’s wars | |
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| Lowly before the Unseen Presence knelt | |
| Each waiting heart, till haply some one felt | |
| On his moved lips the seal of silence melt. | |
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| Or, without spoken words, low breathings stole | 100 |
| Of a diviner life from soul to soul, | |
| Baptizing in one tender thought the whole. | |
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| When shaken hands announced the meeting o’er, | |
| The friendly group still lingered at the door, | |
| Greeting, inquiring, sharing all the store | 105 |
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| Of weekly tidings. Meanwhile youth and maid | |
| Down the green vistas of the woodland strayed, | |
| Whispered and smiled and oft their feet delayed. | |
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| Did the boy’s whistle answer back the thrushes? | |
| Did light girl laughter ripple through the bushes | 110 |
| As brooks make merry over roots and rushes? | |
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| Unvexed the sweet air seemed. Without a wound | |
| The ear of silence heard, and every sound | |
| Its place in nature’s fine accordance found. | |
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| And solemn meeting, summer sky and wood, | 115 |
| Old kindly faces, youth and maidenhood | |
| Seemed, like God’s new creation, very good! * * * * * | |
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