24
OUR COUNTRY.
REFLECTIONS ON THE MORNING OF THE ANNIVERSARY OF OUR INDEPENDENCE, JULY 4, 1814.
HENCE—ye rude sounds, that wake me from my sleep,
And fright away my dreams, peaceful and pure.
I shudder at the cannon's deafning roar,
The martial echo, and the shout of joy
Where joy is not. For say—can joy be there
Where honour and the blissful time of peace
Are parted names? And you, ye peaceful bells,
That call the meek soul to the house of prayer,
Why with your hallow'd voices will ye swell
This morning tumult? Oh, that ye would leave
Me to my slumbers; better 'twere to dream
Of weariness and woe, to scale the cliff
Snow crown'd and dizzy, see the foe approach,
And when you spring to motion find the limbs
Stiff—and the tongue enchain'd; or dare the flood
Upon some broken bridge—Ah! better far
To suffer for an hour, and rise in peace,
Than to muse waking on disastrous war
And glory lost. To wake, alas, and think
That honour once was ours, and find it not,
Is but to wake to pain. To see the wounds
