To join the martyr choir, who even now
Await in bliss their amaranthine crowns.

In milder latitudes the red man roves,
Where vast Missouri gathers in his course
A thousand streams. Noblest of savages,
In war not quite a demon, and in peace
Nought less than man, the Arab of the West ;-
In him, yet unextinct, a faint remain

Of Nature's primal creed, like a sick lamp

Struggling with noxious darkness, strangely gleams.

He nor to Brahma, Budh, nor Jupiter,

Falls down; but, with sublimer faith than erst

Peopled Olympus with vile deities,

Feels the Invisible, invokes his name

"Giver of Life!" and calls his Maker good.

When shall these scatter'd flocks be gather'd home

From the recesses of the wilderness,

At the Good Shepherd's voice?

Couch with the lamb, the lion?

When, in one fold,

Runs not so

The promise of the oracle? Oh, then

The white man shall forgive the Indian's hue,
And the Great Spirit, looking down, behold
His children form one peaceful family.

It spreads! It spreads! the tidings of relief To suffering Nature.-In those guilty isles, Where men grow rich with crime, distilling sweets From human veins, and marketing in blood,— The slave, amid his toils, catches the sound,

And deems his yoke press lighter; hears how Christ
Died e'en for him, and feels himself a man.

Thou Moloch wealth! what sable hecatombs
Of human victims on thine altars groan!

What marvel then if riches grow in hell?

r

But brighter days on western Afric dawn: The long-lost seed, with tears and patience sown, At length has pierced the parch'd and hungry soil;

And the Sierra smiles a Christian land.

S

Not long in enigmatic mystery

Shall Niger roll his stream, nor Nilus keep
The secret of his source. Those central glooms,

Dark 'mid the glare of fiery noon, where basks
The serpent, and the sovereign lion roams,
Barbaric realms, to which, from Atlas top,

Th' arch-foe might point exultant, and repeat
His impious boast, Mine are they all!—for there
Evil is throned and worshipp'd,-even there

Shall penetrate the voice that demons flee.

Press'd in on every side, Idolatry

Shall see her fetish spells o'ermaster'd-see

Her bestial symbols chased back to their dens,"
Till, in his very citadel, the Power

Of Darkness to the meek Redeemer yield.

O Star! the most august of all that clasp The star-girt heav'n, which erst in eastern skies Didst herald, like the light of prophecy,

The Sun of Righteousness,—the harbinger

Of more than natural day; whether thou track

The circuit of the universe, or thrid,

As with a golden clew, the labyrinth

Of suns and systems, still from age to age Auguring to distant spheres some glorious doom; Sure thou thy blessed circle hast well nigh Described, and in the majesty of light,

Bending on thy return, wilt soon announce

His second advent. Yes, even now thy beams
Suffuse the twilight of the nations. Light
Wakes in the region where gross darkness veil'd
The people. They who in death's shadow sat,
Shall hail that glorious rising; for the shade
Prophetic shrinks before the dawning ray
That cast it forms of earth that interposed,
Shall vanish, scatter'd like the dusky clouds
Before the exultant morn; and central day
All shadowless, even to the poles shall reign.

Volume of God! thou art that eastern Star

Which leads to Christ. Soon shall thy circuit reach

Round earth's circumference, in every tongue

Revealing to all nations, what the heavens

But shadow forth, the glory of the Lord.

And are there those, the wisdom of this world,
Who, in base fear and blind astronomy,

With astrolabe or quadrant watch thy path,
Suspicious of thine aspect, save when seen

In certain fair conjunctions, and in nodes
Ideal; who would dare restrict thy light
To time and rule? O foul astrology!

Roll on; free, boundless be thy beauteous course!
and turn those angry clouds to light!

Roll on,

Vain, vain the despot's frown, the bigot's rage!

The gates of knowledge, that for ages slept

Upon their massive hinges, while a few,

By stealth or fee, through the low portal crept,

Where jealous Power was sentineled,—those gates