81. the Defenders.
by Thomas Buchanan Read.
Our flag on the land and our flag on the ocean,An angel of peace wheresoever it goes--
Nobly sustained by Columbia's devotion.
The angel of death it shall be to our foes!
True to its native sky
Still shall the eagle fly,
Casting his sentinel glances afar--
Though bearing the olive branch,
Still in his talons staunch
Grasping the bolts of the thunders of war! [77]
Hark to the sound! there's a foe on our border--
A foe striding on to the gulf of his doom--
Freemen are rising and marching in order,
Leaving the plough, and the anvil and loom.
Rust dims the harvest sheen
Of scythe and sickle keen,
The axe sleeps in peace by the tree it would mar,
Veteran and youth are out,
Swelling the battle-shout,
Grasping the bolts of the thunders of war.
Our brave mountain-eagles swoop from the eyrie,
Our little panthers leap from forest and plain;
Out of the West flash the flames of the prairie,
Out of the East roll the waves of the main.
Down from their Northern shores,
Swift as Niagara pours, [its jar,
They march, and their tread wakes the earth with
Under the Stripes and Stars,
Each with the soul of Mars,
Grasping the bolts of the thunders of war.
Spite of the sword, or assassin's stiletto,
While throbs a heart in the breast of the brave,
The oak of the North or the Southern palmetto
Shall shelter no foe, except in his grave.
While the Gulf-billow breaks,
Echoing the Northern lakes,
And ocean replies unto ocean afar,
Yield we no inch of land,
While there's a patriot hand
Grasping the bolts of the thunders of war
