Above thy head our flag shall spread, The bark sails on; the Pilgrim's cape Whose headland crooks its anchor-flukes No treason here! it cost too dear To win this barren realm! And true and free the hands must be Still on! Manhattan's narrowing bay That flaunts the fallen stars! But watch the light on yonder height,— Some lingering cloud in mist may shroud Say, pilot, what this fort may be, Whose sentinels look down From moated walls that show the sea Whose footprints spoil the "sacred soil," The breakers roar,-how bears the shore? Have quenched the blaze that poured its rays Along the Hatteras sands. Ha! say not so! I see its glow! Again the shoals display The beacon light that shines by night, The Union Stars by day! The good ship flies to milder skies, The wave more g 1.tly flows, The softening breeze wafts o'er the seas What fold is this the sweet winds kiss, Whose shadow palls these orphaned walls, What! heard you not Port Royal's doom? And turned the Beaufort's roses' bloom To redder wreaths of fame? As soon his cursed poison-weed On! on! Pulaski's iron hail Falls harmless on Tybee! Her topsails feel the freshening gale, She rounds the point, she threads the keys The good ship Union's voyage is o'er, And loud and clear with cheer on cheer Hurrah! Hurrah! it shakes the wave, It thunders on the shore, One flag, one land, one heart, one hand, Our poet's pen is still active, employing itself now in prose, And now in verse, both grave and gay, or tender and caustic, as may be seen from month to month on the pages of our leading periodicals. His latest work is Mechanism in Thought and Morals.* "The muse of Holmes is a foe to humbug. He clears the moral atmosphere of the morbid literary and other pretences afloat. People breathe freer for his verse. They shake the cobwebs out of the system, and keep up in * See Supplement G. 12 the world that brisk, healthy current of common sense, which is to the mind what circulation is to the body."* We present the following as one of his most literally rejuvenating poems. "THE BOYS." HAS there any old fellow got mixed with the boys? We're twenty! We're twenty! Who says we are more? Was it snowing I spoke of? Excuse the mistake! We want some new garlands for those we have shed— We've a trick, we young fellows, you may have been told, That boy we call "Doctor," and this we call "Judge;" That fellow's the "Speaker," the one on the right; 'Mr. Mayor," my young one, how are you to-night? That's our 66 Member of Congress," we say when we chaff; There's the "Reverend" What's his name?-don't make me laugh. That boy with the grave mathematical look Made believe he had written a wonderful book, And the ROYAL SOCIETY thought it was true! So they chose him right in,-a good joke it was too! There's a boy, we pretend, with a three-decker brain, And there's a nice youngster of excellent pith,- You hear that boy laughing?-You think he's all fun; Then here's to our boyhood, its gold and its gray! It is not a little singular to note with what unanimity critics, both American and English, agree as touching Holmes' literary character, not only as a whole, but in respect also to its minor qualities. Let us briefly instance the testimony of a few. "The most concise, apt, and effective poet of the school of Pope this country has produced is Oliver Wendell Holmes.' "He possesses Swift's quaintness and motley merri. ment, Pope's polish and graceful point, and the solemn pathos and allied excruciating mirth of Hood."†/ "His fancy teems with bright and appropriate images, and these are woven into his plan usually with exquisite finish and grace." ‡ "His lyrics ring and sparkle like cataracts of silver, and his serious pieces-as successful in their way as those mirthful frolics of his muse for which he is best honored-arrest the attention by touches of the most genuine pathos and tenderness."§ As, for instance, *H. T. Tuckerman. ‡ North American Review, Jan., 1847. + Irish Quarterly Review. 2 R. W. Griswold. UNDER THE VIOLETS. HER hands are cold; her face is white; But not beneath a graven stone, To plead for tears with alien eyes; Shall say, that here a maiden lies And gray old trees of hugest limb Shall wheel their circling shadows round To make the scorching sunlight dim That drinks the greenness from the ground, And drops their dead leaves on her mound. When o'er their boughs the squirrels run, The acorns and the chestnuts fall, For her the morning choir shall sing When, turning round their dial-track, At last the rootlets of the trees Shall find the prison where she lies, |