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To the wild sounds of fear and death—
—Toussaint l'Ouverture!
What marvel that his heart beat high!
The blow for freedom had been given;
And blood had answered to the cry
Which earth sent up to heaven!
What marvel, that a fierce delight
Smiled grimly o'er his brow of night,
As groan, and shout, and bursting flame,
Told where the midnight tempest came;
With blood and fire along its van,
And death behind!—he was a MAN!
Yes—dark-souled chieftain!—if the light
Of mild Religion's heavenly ray
Unveiled not to thy mental sight
The lowlier and the purer way,
In which the Holy Sufferer trod,
Meekly amidst the sons of crime,—
That calm reliance upon God
For justice, in his own good time,—
That gentleness, to which belongs
Forgiveness for its many wrongs;
Even as the primal martyr, kneeling
For mercy on the evil-dealing,—
Let not the favored white man name
Thy stern appeal, with words of blame.
Has he not, with the light of heaven
Broadly around him, made the same—
Yea,—on a thousand war-fields striven,
And gloried in his open shame
