Stedman and Hutchinson, comps. A Library of American Literature:
An Anthology in Eleven Volumes. 1891.
Vols. IX–XI: Literature of the Republic, Part IV., 1861–1889
Of Thine Own Country Sing
By William Ross Wallace (18191881)I
In Huron’s forest vast and dim;
I saw her sweep a harp with stately hand;
I heard her solemn hymn.
From her own broad imperial clime;
Of nations new to whom she gave the sway:
She sang of God and Time.
I saw the Present clearly glow;
Shapes with veiled faces paced a far dim shore
And whispered “Joy” and “Woe!”
Our wide, calm rivers rolled along,
And many a mighty lake and prairie lay
In the shadow of her song.
Wild wind majestically flies
From crag to crag till on the top at last
The wild wind proudly dies,
Crown me with song as thou art crowned?”
She, smiling, pointed to the spotless sky
And the forest-tops around,—
Must thou for inspiration go:
There Milton’s large imperial organ swelled,
There Avon’s waters flow.
Made sorrow fair, unchallenged dwells—
Where deep-eyed Dante with the wreath of fire
Came chanting from his hells.
Of Europe in her song enshrined:
These, going wind-like o’er thy Sea of Dreams,
May liberalize the mind.
Musing at noon beneath her stately palms,
Her angel-lore, her wide-browed prophecies,
Her solemn-sounding psalms:
Smoulder in dreams, beneath their swarthy lids,
Of youthful Sphinx, and kings at loud acclaim
On new-built Pyramids,
And choral inspiration spring;
If thou wouldst touch the universal heart,
O