James and Mary Ford, eds. Every Day in the Year. 1902.
December 21The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers in New England
By Felicia Dorothea Hemans (17931835)T
On a stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods against a stormy sky
Their giant branches tossed;
The hills and waters o’er,
When a band of exiles moored their bark
On the wild New-England shore.
They, the true-hearted, came;
Not with the roll of the stirring drums,
And the trumpet that sings of fame;
In silence and in fear;—
They shook the depths of the desert gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer.
And the stars heard, and the sea;
And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang
To the anthem of the free!
From his nest by the white wave’s foam;
And the rocking pines of the forest roared—
This was their welcome home!
Amidst that pilgrim band:
Why had they come to wither there,
Away from their childhood’s land?
Lit by her deep love’s truth;
There was manhood’s brow serenely high,
And the fiery heart of youth.
Bright jewels of the mine?
The wealth of seas, the spoils of war?—
They sought a faith’s pure shrine!
The soil where first they trod.
They have left unstained what there they found—
Freedom to worship God.