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4190

This is the land where love and pity mourn
O'er the soft Indian's monumental urn;
Virginia's jewel, and her sex's pride,
Who on a foreign shore untimely died.
Not to one spot is sympathy confin'd,
Throughout the world in woman's breast enshrin'd,
Whether her gentle footsteps press the sand
Of Chesapeak, or Scythia's frozen land.
Thy heart was its sweet temple, tawny maid,
Blest Pocahontas, whose wild shrieks delay'd
The axe rais'd o'er the white man, pinion'd, bound,
The gallant Smith, bow'd trembling to the ground.*

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* Captain John Smith, a gallant Englishman, was the founder of the Colony of Virginia, on the great Bay of Chesapeak; and Pocahontas, the daughter of the Indian Monarch Powhatan, was its interesting protectress. Smith, in an excursion, being surprized by a numerous body of red-men, under Opechancanough, was conducted to Powhatan, who doomed him to death: he was led to the place of execution, and his head bowed down to receive the blow of the warclub, when Pocahontas rushed with mournful distraction through the crowd, and throwing her little arms about him, (she was by Smith's account only nine years old,) saved his life by her interposition. After this event she frequently visited Smith at James Town, whom she always addressed by the name of father, and at the age of seventeen married Mr. John Rolf, a young gentleman of rank in the colony, who had long been her respectful lover. She accompanied her husband to England with Sir Thomas Dale, where Smith, who had preceded them, presented Pocahontas to James and his Queen, who received her with the respect due to a princess. This interesting Indian, whose whole life exemplified that

Fine Spirits

Are touch'd to fine Issues,

died in early youth at Gravesend, when preparing to embark with

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She flies on seraph's wing, and through the crowd,
With piercing cry, 'mid acclamations loud,
Seeks the pale victim, by compassion led,
And in her arms sustains his languid head.
Meantime her female train in cadence mourn,
Sigh as she sighs, and tears for tears return,
They raise her tranc'd in grief-a glossy shade
Of hair half veils the melancholy maid-
Streams from her eyes-sobs from her bosom flow-
And pale that cheek where the rose loves to glow.
The monarch, rising, cries, Restrain thy fears! 4210
Thou weep'st too much, and yet I love those tears.
Thou flow'ry sweet, not vainly dost thou plead-
What means my child? here rest thy fainting head.
Hold, chiefs, the club: 'tis this dear maiden's call-
She sways her father, and presides o'er all. 5215

With solemn awe, I view the spreading shore,
By venerable Druids trod of yore.

Those bloody priests, an execrable band,
Would scandal heap upon a Mohawk land.
Their tragic pomp, their heav'n's vicegerent seer,
Their potent adder-stone, their milk white steer,

her husband for her native country; leaving a son who left only daughters, from whom are descended the Bowlings and Murrays, the Jeffersons and Randolphs, the Middletons and Pierpoints, the patricians of Virginia.

Their mystic misletoe, their hallow'd oak,
Once reverend held, is now a standing joke.

See you yon living rock of spheric shape
Rough and unhewn, exalted o'er the cape?
Pois'd as by magic, to a patriot hand
The huge mass vibrates—to a hostile band
Immoveable, it scorns their touch profane,
Decreed by fate unshaken to remain.

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Captain, you ne'er the loggen-stone* could move, Though nerv'd your arm-the land has not your love On which it rests

None there from me is due

It looks misplac'd-preposterous in you.

But, see, our sweet breeze leaves us from the west-
At no one point the dog-vanet seems to rest.
Doctor, your aid! your spy-glass lay aside-
Let the ship's cordage through your fingers glide.

* The Loggens, or rocking stones, in Cornwall, are immense masses of granite set on others of a smaller size, and so equally counterpoised that they can be stirred with a finger, but not moved out of their station. The Druids in their trials, by artfully converting the Loggen into an engine of superstition, made it answer the purpose of an ordeal. Mason has introduced it in his declamatory tragedy.

The dog-vane is a small light vane with feathers and cork, whose staff is placed on the ship's quarter to shew the direction of the wind.

For once turn sailor-help us with this brail-
The spanker* is become an idle sail.

Jump to the cleat-let the gaff-haliards fly—
Randolph clap on-a bowse here at the guy.
Cheerly the brails-I see a coning squall-
When I cry pull, mind, doctor, that you haul.

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A sail there hoa! nothing but ships around- 4245
A Lisbon packet into Falmouth bound-
A bark for passengers you may discern
By the rich gilding of her sculptur'd stern.
With two reefs in, and a top-gallant breeze,
Her captain turns to windward at his ease.
An Englishman-brac'd sharp up to the gale,
No other from the main-stay shows a sail.‡
She hoists her flag-the waters of the deep
Reflect the union at her mizen-peak.

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Greatly they marvel at our stars-our prow- 4255 Our pointed guns-a savage looking row.

The spanker is a large sail set upon the mizen yard; it is reduced by ropes called brails.

+ The guy is a rope used to keep steady the spanker-boom.

In Britsh ships the main-top-mast stay-sail is used upon a bow. line in American vessels it is never set unless going large. The Yankey ships are so square-rigged, that, when close-hauled, a maintop-mast stay-sail would defeat its purpose, by taking the wind out of the main-topsail.

Our crew they put down Indians-from the wood→
Guiding a ship the first time o'er the flood-

A feather'd tribe of most uncouth attire,
More skill'd in ambush than the main-deck fire.
With bow and quiver at each warrior's side,
And scalping knife the skull's skin to divide ;
Our cargo coral, humming-birds, and shells,
To barter with the whites for toys and bells!

XIII.

Oh! all that in this life the breast employs, 4265 Is real grief, or visionary joys.

Now thread the hatchway those whom hoary age

Has capt with snow in foreign pilgrimage,

Returning exiles to their native land,

Victims to hope deferr'd, a weary band.

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From his own shore-the soil that gave him birth,
An old man comes to beg a little earth-
Who, as the tars direct his feeble gaze,
And point the hand, thus drivels out his praise:
That is the land where every peasant's shed,
Whose smoke at early morn is seen to spread
Along the dappled sky, stands more secure
Than eastern palaces that forts immure.
Oh! it is sweet to breathe again the air
That britons breathe-to wake from dark despair-

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