Page:Pocahontas, and Other Poems.djvu/19

Rh .

Roll on, majestic flood, in power and pride,

Which like a sea doth swell old ocean's sway;—

With hasting keel, thy pale-fac'd sponsors glide

To keep the pageant of thy christening day.

They bless thy wave, they bid thee leave unsung

The uncouth baptism of a barbarous tongue,

And take his name,—the Stuart's,—first to bind

The Scottish thistle in the lion's mane,

Of all old Albion's kings, most versatile and vain.

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Spring robes the vales. With what a flood of light

She holds her revels in this sunny clime;—

The flower-sown turf, like bossy velvet bright,

The blossom'd trees exulting in their prime;

The leaping streamlets in their joyous play,

The birds that frolic 'mid the diamond spray,

Or heavenward soar, with melody sublime:—

What wild enchantment spreads a fairy wing,

As from their prisoning ships the enfranchis'd strangers spring.

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Their tents are pitch'd, their spades have broke the soil,

The strong oak thunders, as it topples down,

Their lily-handed youths essay the toil,

That from the forest rends its ancient crown: