Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Spain, Portugal, Belgium, and Holland: Vols. XIV–XV. 1876–79.
Holland in the Olden Time
By Joost van den Vondel (1587–1679)(From the Batavian Brothers)
Translated by John Bowring
Strophe
Ere foreign tyrants brought
The servile iron yoke, which bound
Our necks with humbling slavery to the ground.
Once all was confidence and peace;—the just
Might to his neighbor trust;
The common plough turned up the common land,
And Nature scattered joy with liberal hand.
The humble cot of clay
Kept the thick shower, the wind, and hail away.
Upon the frugal board
No luxuries were stored;
But ’neath a forest-tree the table stood,—
A simple plank, unpolished and rude:
Our feasts the wild game of the wood,
And curds and cheese our daily food.
Man, in his early virtues blest,
Slept satisfied on woman’s breast,
Who, modest and confiding, saw
In him her lord and love and law.
Then was the stranger and the neighbor each
Welcomed with cordial thoughts and honest speech;
And days flowed cheerful on, as days should flow,
Unmoved by distant or domestic woe.
Nor golden stores, nor coin, nor dazzling rings;
They bartered what they had for what they wanted,
And sought no foreign shores, but planted
Their own low dwellings in their mother land;
Raised all by their own hand,
And furnisht with whatever man requires
For his moderate desires.
They had no proud adornings,—were not gilt
Nor sculptured,—nor in crowded cities built;
But in wide scattered villages they spread
Where stand no friendly lamps above the head:
Rough and undeckt the simple cot,
With the rich show of pomp encumbered not.
As when in decorated piles are seen
The bright fruits peeping through the foliage green;
Bark of the trees and hides of cattle cover
The lowly hut when storms rage fiercely over;
Man had not learnt the use of stone,
Tiles and cement were all unknown;
Some place of shelter dug, dark, dreary, far,
For the dread hour of danger or of war,
When the stray pirate broke on the serene
And cheerful quiet of that early scene.
His fellow-men had curst;
The coarse-wove flax, the unwrought fleece alone,
On the half-naked sturdy limbs were thrown:
The daughters married late
To a laborious fate;
And to their husbands bore a healthy race,
To take their fathers’ place.
If e’er dispute or discord dared intrude,
’T was soon, by wisdom’s voice, subdued;
The wisest then was called to reign,
The bravest did the victory gain:
The proud were made to feel
They must submit them to the general weal;
For to the proud and high a given way
Was marked, that thence they might not stray;—
And thus was freedom kept alive.
Rulers were taught to strive
For subjects’ happiness, and subjects brought
The cheerful tribute of obedient thought;
And ’t was indeed a glorious sight
To see them wave their weapons bright:
No venal bands, the murderous hordes of fame;
But freedom’s sons,—all armed in freedom’s name.
Nor in his favor.—Wisdom’s train sedate
Of books and proud philosophy
And stately speech, could never needed be,
While they for virtue’s counsellings might look
On Nature’s open book,
Where bright and free the Godhead’s glory falls;—
Not on the imprisoning walls
Of temples; for their temple was the wood,—
The heavens its arch, its aisles were solitude.
And then they sang the praise
Of heroes and the seers of older days:
They never dared to pry
Into the mysteries of the Deity;
They never weighed his schemes, nor judged his will,
But saw his works, and loved and praised him still;
Obeyed in awe, kept pure their hearts within,
For this they knew,—God hates and scourges sin:
Some dreams of future bliss were theirs,
To gild their joys and chase their cares;
And thus they dwelt, and thus they died,
With guardian-freedom at their side,
The happy tenants of a happy soil,
Till came the cruel stranger to despoil.
The strangers now possess our land;
Batavia is subdued at last,—
Batavia fettered, ruined, banned!
Yes! honor, truth, have taken flight
To seats sublimer, thrones more pure.
Look, Julius! from thy throne of light,
See what thy Holland’s sons endure;
Thy children still are proud to claim
Their Roman blood, their source from thee;
Friends, brothers, comrades, bear the name,—
Desert them not in misery!
Terror and power and cruel wrong
Have a free people’s bliss undone;
Too harsh their sway, their rule too long.
Arouse thee from thy cloudy throne;
And if thou hate disgrace and crime,
Recall, recall departed time.