The York Reader; A Collection of Oratorical, Poetical, and Miscellaneous Passages, Compiled by F. Thorp and J.F. Fryer

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1866 Excerpt: ...clang of horsemen's steel. No trains of deep-mouthed cannon along our highways go--Around our silent arsenals untrodden lies the snow; And to the land breeze of our ports, upon their errands far, A thousand sails of commerce swell, but none are spread for war. We hear thy threats, Virginia! thy stormy words and high Swell harshly on the Southern winds which melt along our sky; Yet not one brown hard hand foregoes its honest labour here--No hewer of our mountain oaks suspends his axe in fear. Wild are the waves which lash the reefs along St. George's bank--Cold on the shore of Labrador the fog lies white and dank; Through storm, and wave, and blinding mist, stout are the hearts which man The fishing-smacks of Marblehead, the sea-boats of Cape Ann. The cold north light and wintry sun glare on their icy forms, Bent grimly o'er their straining lines or wrestling with the storms; Free as the winds they drive before, rough as the waves they roam, They laugh to scorn the slaver's threat against their rocky home. What means the Old Dominion? hath she forgot the day When o'er her conquered valleys swept the Briton's steel array 1 How side by side with sons of hers, the Massachusetts men Encountered Tarleton's charge of fire, and stout Cornwallis, then? Forgets she how the Bay State, in answer to the call Of her old House of Burgesses, spoke out from Faneuil Hall? When, echoing back her Henry's cry, came pulsing on each breath Of northern winds, the thrilling sounds of Liberty Ok Death. What asks the Old Dominion? if now her sons have proved False to their fathers' memory--false to the faith they loved; If she can scoff at Freedom, and its great charter spurn, Must we of Massachusetts from truth and duty turn? We hunt your bondmen, flying from Slavery's ...