THE WASHINGTON ELM,
AT CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS.
Words! Words, Old Tree! Thou hast an aspect fair,
A vigorous heart, a heaven-aspiring crest,
And sleepless memories of the days that were
Lodge in thy branches, like the song-bird's nest.
Words! give us words! Methought a gathering blast
Mid its green leaves began to murmur low,
Shaping its utterance to the mighty Past,
That backward came, on pinions floating slow.
"The ancient masters of the soil I knew,
Whose cane-roofed wigwams flecked the forest brown,
Their hunter-footsteps swept the early dew,
And their keen arrow struck the eagle down.
I heard the bleak December tempest moan,
When the tossed May-Flower moored in Plymouth Bay;
And watched yon classic walls, as stone by stone
The fathers reared them slowly towards the day.
But lo! a mighty Chieftain 'neath my shade,
Drew his bright sword, and reared his dauntless head,
And Liberty sprang forth from rock and glade,
And donned her helmet for the hour of dread:
While in the hero's heart there dwelt a prayer,
That Heaven's protecting arm might never cease,
To make his young, endangered land its care,
Till through the war-cloud looked the angel Peace.
Be wise, my children," said that ancient Tree,
In earnest tone, as though a Mentor spake,
"And prize the blood-bought birthright of the free,
And firmly guard it, for your country's sake."
Thanks, thanks, Old Elm! and for this counsel sage,
May heaven thy brow with added beauty grace,
Grant richer emeralds to thy crown of age,
And changeless honors from a future race.
This fine old Elm, on the Common, at Cambridge, doubtless a remnant of the primeval forest, has a heritage of glory. Beneath its shade, Washington first drew his sword, as Commander-in-Chief of the American army. It is thus associated with one of the most important eras in our history, and in the life of that illustrious man, who was "first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen." From the flash of that sword, beneath these branches, until it was finally sheathed at Yorktown, what heart-stirring events transpired for the historian, the politician, and the poet. The drama, which was conceived and commenced by the "Bay State," the noble mother of New England, and which in its progress more or less convulsed every member of the "Old Thirteen," reached its catastrophe and termination of glory in the "Ancient Dominion," where first the Saxon vine took root in the soil of this New World.
The venerated Tree, thus forever connected with the memory of the Father of our country, has a fitting and beautiful locality. Its foliage almost sweeps the walls of the most ancient University in the United States, for which the first appropriation was made in 1636, the year after the fathers of Connecticut took their departure from Cambridge, and began the settlement of Hartford.
It is touching and even sublime to recall the efforts made by our ancestors, to secure the means of education for their descendants, while themselves enduring the hardships and privations attendant on colonial life. Sixteen years from the first landing on the snow-clad rock of Plymouth had scarcely elapsed, ere they laid the plan of a collegiate institution, the poorest contributing from his poverty, perhaps only a bushel of corn, or a single volume, yet given with gladness and in hope. The infant colonies of Connecticut and New Haven, testified also their sympathy and good neighborhood, by a benefaction from every family, of twelve pence or a peck of corn,—gifts of no slight value in those days of simplicity.
How truly was it said by our ancestors, in a work written more than two hundred years since: "After God had carried us safe to New England, and we had builded our houses, provided necessaries for our livelihood, reared convenient places for God's worship and settled the civil government, one of the next things we longed for and looked after, was to advance learning, and perpetuate it to posterity."
The Washington Elm is also in the vicinity of the sacred, solitudes of Mount Auburn, that spot which has so often given a subject to the traveller and the bard, but whose unique beauty it is impossible to appreciate, without the privilege of musing amid its hallowed shades.