Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

William McCarty, comp. The American National Song Book. 1842.

Union and Liberty

HARK! the trumpet of war from the east sounds alarms,

And Columbia forewarns to prepare for commotion;

Mighty Gallia on land bends the world to her arms,

While Britannia enslaves with her navy the ocean;

By no laws they’re restrain’d:

Every right they’ve disdain’d,

With the slaughter of millions their cause is maintain’d.

Then unite, all ye sons of Columbia, unite,

Your country demands you—prepare for the fight.

The lust of dominion each tyrant inflames,

And Europe enkindles in fiercest contention;

By strength if they fail to accomplish their aims,

Intrigue light the fire of intestine dissension;

E’en our realm they have tried

By finesse to divide,

But their force and their cunning alike we deride;

For as one will the sons of Columbia unite

When their country demands them, and march for the fight.

Napoleon may boast of the deeds he has done,

And in conquest surpass e’en the mad Alexander;

May count all the victories his vassals have won,

Where slaves were his foes, and a slave their commander.

Swift as light through the sky

Should his myrmidons fly,

As a rampart our breasts their attacks would defy;
For as one, &c.

Let old England exult in her castles of wood,

And shake every port in the East with her thunder;

Let her quench her ambition with oceans of blood,

And, wing’d by the winds, feed her avarice with plunder;

Her huge lion may roar,

With his mane bathed in gore:

Still America’s eagle triumphant shall soar;
For as one, &c.

When our ancestors sought in this clime a retreat

From the horrors of slavery and fell persecution,

Here the goddess of Liberty planted her seat,

Secured by its distance from Europe’s pollution;

And her hallow’d fane

Undented shall remain,

Till time shall be lost in eternity’s reign.
For as one, &c.

Though our Moses has mounted to regions of day,

Where heroes e’er banquet on blisses supernal,

We have thousands of Joshuas who still point the way

That shall proudly conduct us to glory eternal;

While each patriot sire,

Like a pillar of fire,

Round his orb sheds a light that shall never expire;
Then as one, &c.

Our vales each production luxuriant will yield;

The stores of the world on our clime are attendant:

Not a blade but proclaims, as it waves on the field,

That in fact, as of right, we may be independent;

All the groves catch the sound,

Every stream bears it round,

While its echoes from mountain to mountain rebound;
Then as one, &c.

Then the bloodhounds of war, an infuriate band,

May threat with their legions the world’s devastation;

Protected by union, our country shall stand

Like the mountains of ages, till earth’s conflagration;

And when Liberty flies

To her seat in the skies,

Upborne on her wings every votary shall rise;
Then as one, &c.