FUGITIVE PIECES IN VERSE.

THE following are extracts from a poem recited before the Massachusetts Legislative Temperance Society, in 1846, and subsequently repeated, by invitation, in many of the cities and large towns of New England.

An aged mother, in her fierce despair,
Scatters the tresses of her silver hair,
Frantic rebels against the biting rod,
And spurns the comfort of the man of God.
Would you what caused the desolation know,
That wearies echo with its voice of woe?
'Tis not that yonder gibbet rears on high
Its black, grim outline sharp against the sky;
'Tis not that on that plank her first-born stands,
His brother's blood scarce dried upon his hands;
The cause lies farther-where that crime was brewed,
In a shop "licensed for the public good"!
Where murder, arson, rape are brought to pass,

With hell-broth vended at three cents a glass.
And thus her hands that childless widow wrings,
And thus that fratricidal felon swings,

While the accessory before the fact

Goes free, in goods and character intact.

Look on yon alms-house, where from day to day
The grave seems cheated of its lawful prey;
Mark well those squallid paupers, and declare
What brought nineteen in twenty of them there.
Could but the truth upon the canvas glow,
The force of fancy could no farther go.

Ghast Atrophy should gather up his shroud,
And half-choked Asthma wheeze his wrongs aloud;
There pale Consumption by your side should stand,
And tottering Palsy point with trembling hand;
Fierce Frenzy's haggard eye with fury glare,
While Cholera should poison all the air.

All these, and more, with Babel-like acclaims,
Should cry to God and man their authors' names.
And thus this scourge holds on its noisome way,
To sicken, madden, poison, wound, and slay.
Ay, thus it ever has gone on, and still,

Till we apply the remedy, it will;

Till our New England be with graves o'erspread,

One vast, continuous city of the dead;

And we might build a pyramid of bones
As high as Cheops's, instead of stones.

O for the potent rod in Moses' hand,
To bid this plague depart from out our land;
A plague more pitiless than Egypt knew,
It smites our first-born and our youngest too.
But why invoke the prophet's wand of power?
It lies within our reach this very hour.
Law, law's the rod we at this crisis need;
The courage, not the strength, we lack, indeed;
Our hands command the thong, but hardly dare
To lay it on. O, cowards that we are!
We pause and hesitate, when one more blow
Might end the contest with our common foe.

-

Meanwhile rum-sellers, with exultant voice,
In their short respite from their doom rejoice;
Ply with increasing zeal the work of death,
Nor pause to let humanity take breath.
Shout, drunkard-makers, while ye may -your sport
Is nigh its close; root, swine! your time is short,
Though longer than we hoped, or ye had feared;
A few brief months shall bring you your reward;.
And that ye may not chide us for delay,
We'll count you interest to the reckoning day.

Your dues shall yet be paid, all at a dash,
In fines, and costs, and iron window sash.

How will they sputter, scold, blaspheme, and swear,
To find themselves accounted what they are!
When justice, long outraged, shall ply her thong
On shoulders which have been unwhipped too long.
Methinks I hear their voice of wail and woe,
Falling on my prophetic ear-drum now.

"Alack! alas! and well-a-day! in vain did lawyers plead ;
Our last appeal has surely failed! there is a God indeed;
I've doubted it this many a day, but now, perforce, I see
There is a Judge who can't be reached with any kind of fee.

"So many channels stopped, it is a sorry sight to see,

Through which my rum flowed constant out, and gain flowed in to me;

Where are the rights our fathers fought for? and pray tell me where Our liberties are fled! O, this is more than I can bear.

"Ye sympathizing sextons, and ye undertakers too, The ruin that descends on me is most as hard on you;

Ye doctors, and ye constables, come join with me and weep; 'Othello's occupation's gone,' and we may go to

-sleep.

"Behind the bar shall I, alas! no longer cut a swell,
The ragged drunkard's patron saint, the loafer's oracle?
And must I, ere my fortune's made, in my vocation stop?
And must I take to honesty? and must I shut up shop?

"Ah, woe is me! my customers will learn to drop their coin
And pawn their coats in other shops, in other tills than mine,
For bread, or such like useless stuff, but never more will see
One drop of comfort, such as they were wont to get from me.

"And must I go, indeed, to work? I cannot, cannot do it;
I doubt if stern necessity can ever bring me to it.

Does Satan, whom I've served so long, now leave me in the lurch? At least, I'll be revenged on him—I'll go and join the church.

"When troubles thronged on every side, we, as a last resort, Had turned our eyes, with grief inflamed, up to the Supreme Court

But gone, alas! are all our hopes: that sun went down at noon; Curse on those judges' judgment, they have blown us to the moon.

"Well, turn about, since Adam's time, was ever held fair play,
And 'tis a proverb, old and true, each dog must have his day;
And there's one comfort left for us, as law and gospel true,
That we've had ours, each dog of us
a pretty long one too.

"And if hard work should prove too hard for unaccustomed paws,
And should the law break us, who long were used to break the laws,
We still can steal; the sin, and shame, and risk cannot be more,
In secret theft, than in the work done openly before.

"My curse, a hot and blasting curse, on every temperance man; On Beecher, Edwards, Hawkins, Grant, and all the accursed clan. A special curse is richly due that rhyming, ranting Jewett; Powerless himself to work us harm, he urged the rest to do it."

But rising high above this cry and hue,
Hark to the shout that rends the concave blue!
The shout exulting multitudes employ !
The shout of millions in triumphant joy!

Hear the poor drunkard, ragged, sick, and sore,
Thanking his God that grog-shops are no more.
And hear that wife express her joy of soul
That none shall dare henceforth to fill the bowl
For her poor, thoughtless husband. Far away
Her night of sorrow flies; she greets the day.
"Thank God," she cries, "my husband turns from sin;
He cannot, if he would, offend again.

My husband's safe; and now let him beware,

Who for his feebler neighbor spreads the snare.

At last the rod for which stern justice calls,

Not on the tempted, but the tempter falls.
Too oft, alas! a sense of grievous wrong

Drew forth the murmur, 'Lord! how long, how long?'
I dreamed not then this day of days to see,
But thought myself forgotten, Lord, of thee.
I bow me now, repentant, in the dust;
Again I give thee back my boundless trust.

Join with me, mothers all, throughout the land
Join with me, little children, hand in hand!
Rejoice! your sufferings at length are o'er;
Your grovelling fathers can be brutes no more.
Our prayers are heard, at our extremest need,
For Massachusetts now is free indeed."

Men of the Bay State-yea, and women, too-
This triumph still remains in store for you;
On you humanity and duty call;
Up and about it, brethren, one and all.
Say, shall your own old Massachusetts be
Now backward in the cause of liberty?
Who struck the first resolved, decisive blow
Against the bondage of a foreign foe?
Who ever foremost stands in war and peace?
And shall the strife for independence cease
Now, when the need is greater than of yore;
Now, when a tyrant knocks at every door;
Now, when awakened Massachusetts stands,
And holds the remedy in her own hands?
Think of your children! all that's dear in life,
Combine to urge you onward to the strife.
Strike! for you owe it to your buried great;
Strike! for you owe it to your native state,
To rid her soil of this supreme disgrace;

You owe it to yourselves, your country, and your race

I'D sooner black my visage o'er,

And put de shine on boots and shoes,

Than stand within a liquor store,

And rinse the glasses drunkards use.