| |
| “LAND! land!” how welcome is the word | |
| To all,—or landsmen bred or seamen! | |
| Deep in their lairs the sick are stirred,— | |
| The decks are thronged with smiling women. | |
| The face that had gone down in tears | 5 |
| Ten days since in the British Channel, | |
| Now, like Aurora, reappears,— | |
| Aurora wrapped in furs and flannel. | |
| |
| “Where?” “Yonder, on the right, dost see | |
| A firm dark line, and close thereunder | 10 |
| A white line drawn along the sea, | |
| A flashing line whose voice is thunder?” | |
| “It seems to be a fearsome coast,— | |
| No trees, no hospitable whiffs,— | |
| God help the crew whose ship is lost | 15 |
| On yonder homicidal cliffs!” | |
| |
| “Amen!” say I to that sweet prayer: | |
| “The land, indeed, looks sad and stern, | |
| No female savans’ field-day there, | |
| Collecting butterflies and fern. | 20 |
| An iron land it seems from far, | |
| On which no shepherd’s flock reposes; | |
| Lashed by the elemental war, | |
| The land is not a land of roses.” | |
| |
| Proudly, O Prima Vista! still, | 25 |
| Where sweeps the sea-hawk’s fearless pinion, | |
| Do thou unfurl from every hill | |
| The banner of the New Dominion! | |
| Proudly to all who sail the sea, | |
| Bear then, advanced, the Union standard, | 30 |
| And friendly may its welcome be | |
| To all men, seaward bound or landward! | |
| |
| All hail! old Prima Vista! long | |
| As break the billows on thy boulders, | |
| Will seamen hail thy lights with song, | 35 |
| And home-hopes quicken all beholders. | |
| Long as thy headlands point the way | |
| Between man’s old and new creation, | |
| Evil fall from thee like the spray, | |
| And hope illumine every station! | 40 |
| |
| Long may thy hardy sons count o’er | |
| The spoils of ocean, won by labor; | |
| Long may the free, unbolted door | |
| Be open to each trusty neighbor! | |
| Long, long may blossom on thy rocks | 45 |
| Thy sea-pinks, fragrant as the heather; | |
| Thy maidens of the flowing locks | |
| Safe sheltered from life’s stormy weather! | |
| |
| Yes! this is Prima Vista! this | |
| The very landmark we have prayed for; | 50 |
| Darkly they wander who have missed | |
| The guidance yon stern land was made for. | |
| Call it not homicidal, then, | |
| The New World’s outwork; grim its beauty, | |
| This guardian of the lives of men, | 55 |
| Clad in the garb that does its duty! | |
| |
| Less gayly trills the lover lark | |
| Above the singing swain at morning, | |
| Than rings through sea-mists chill and dark | |
| This name of welcome and of warning. | 60 |
| Not happier to his cell may go | |
| The saint, triumphant o’er temptation, | |
| Than the worn captain turns below, | |
| Relieved as by a revelation. | |
| |
| How blest, when Cabot ventured o’er | 65 |
| This northern sea, yon rocks rose gleaming! | |
| A promised land seemed Labrador | |
| (Nor was the promise all in seeming); | |
| Strong sea-wall, still it stands to guard | |
| An island fertile, fair as any, | 70 |
| The rich, but the unreaped reward | |
| Of Cabot and of Verrazzani! | |
| |
