The writings of John Greenleaf Whittier, Volume 3.
John Greenleaf Whittier, Ed.

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[78]
     Still with affection's fondest yearning
To their unnatural mother turning.
     No traitors they! but tried and leal,
Whose own is but thy general weal,
     Still blending with the patriot's zeal
The Christian's love for human kind,
     To caste and climate unconfined.

A holy gathering! peaceful all:
     No threat of war, no savage call
For vengeance on an erring brother!
     But in their stead the godlike plan
To teach the brotherhood of man
     To love and reverence one another,
As sharers of a common blood,
     The children of a common God!
Yet, even at its lightest word,
     Shall Slavery's darkest depths be stirred:
Spain, watching from her Moro's keep
     Her slave-ships traversing the deep,
And Rio, in her strength and pride,
     Lifting, along her mountain-side,
Her snowy battlements and towers,
     Her lemon-groves and tropic bowers,
With bitter hate and sullen fear
     Its freedom-giving voice shall hear;
And where my country's flag is flowing,
     On breezes from Mount Vernon blowing,
Above the Nation's council halls,
     Where Freedom's praise is loud and long,
While close beneath the outward walls
     The driver plies his reeking thong;
The hammer of the man-thief falls,