Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 1.djvu/198

 190 FIRST CONTEST OF THE REVOLUTION.

v.

How grand, upon a moonlit eve, to glide

Upon thy waters, 'twixt the mountains high,

And gaze within thy azure crystal tide, On trembling shadows of the earth and sky j

While all is silent, save when trusty oar

Awakes an echo from thy slumbering shore !

VI.

Ah ! where shall mortals holier ground espy , From which to look where hope doth point the gaze,

Than from the spot that speaks a Deity, In hoary accents of primeval praise ?

And where shall man a purer altar find

From which to worship the Almighty mind?

VII.

Roll on, sweet Lake ! and if perchance thy form Laves less of earth than floods of western fame,

Yet still we love thee, in the calm or storm, And call thee ours by many a kindly name ;

What patriot heart but loves the scenes that come

O'er memory's sea, to breathe a tale of " home."

VIII.

And when the winter, in its frozen thrall, Binds up thy locks in braids of icy wreath, m

Forget we not thy cherished name to call, In fitting shadow of the sleep of death ;

But morn shall dawn upon our sleep, and we,

As thou in springtime, wake, sweet Sunapee!

��FIRST CONTEST OF THE BE VOLUTION.

��[FROM DR. QUINT'S CENTENNIAL ORATION.]

On the thirteenth of December, 1774, was notified, and led twenty men. It

into Portsmouth came riding that gallant was determined to seize Fort William

rider, Paul Revere. He brought from and Mary. The movement was to be

William Cooper, of Boston, an official open. John Langdon, then an officer of

dispatch to Samuel Cutts, of the local militia, and John Sullivan, who was then

committee. The king in council had pro- drilling a volunteer company in antici-

hibited the exportation of military stores pation of war, were leaders. Gov. Went-

from England, and orders were out to worth knew of the plan, and informed

seize all munitions of war in the colonies, the commander of the fort. "About

He brought also the rumor that two roy- twelve o'clock" of the next day, wrote

al regiments were to be sent to the Pis- the Governor to the Earl of Dartmouth

cataqua. The committee met and decid- six days later, "news was brought to me

ed. It sent dispatches to the neighbor- that a drum was beating about the town

ing towns. John Sullivan, of Durham, to collect the populace together in order

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