John Greenleaf Whittier (1807–1892). The Poetical Works in Four Volumes. 1892.
Occasional PoemsThe Landmarks
Fast the red-winged terror sped;
With its hundred tongues of flame,
Stood like chained Andromeda,
Swift doom or deliverer!
Over walls no longer new,
Four entombed and one alive;
Battleward from Marblehead;
Treville’s lilied pennons play,
By the barge of Lafayette,
Of the coming fleet of France!
Quaint in desk and chandelier;
Burials tolled and bridals rung;
Keys that Snetzler’s hand had swept;
Sinai’s law its thunders rolled!
“Look! St. Michael’s is aflame!”
Snake-like wound its coil of ire.
From the jealousies of sect,
“Save it, though our roof-trees fall!”
One, the bravest, outward swung
Smoked beneath the holder’s hands,
Burning fragments from the tower.
Broke the painful pause of breath;
With home’s ashes at their feet;
“Thank the Lord! St. Michael’s saved!”
Stands the church of old renown,
Which set free a continent;
Prophecies of freedom fell;
Rang the nation’s birth-day in!
Perilled like St. Michael’s tower,
But by mammon’s grasping claim.
She is shamed by Marblehead?
Hast thou none to do and dare?
Shall not wealth be staked for thine?
Vainly for the Old South Church;
All thy pride of place is gone;
Stretched before them wide and far,
Wilderness of brick and slate,
By the commonplace of trade!
Duty is but destiny.
Keep with thy traditions faith;
Hold its flowing forelock fast;
Of a grand munificence;
Give, as thou didst yesterday
Need’s demand from fired St. John.
Free the generous deed to tell.
In the glad, sonorous voice,
Of the bell of the Old South,—
“What she was is Boston still!”