Classic Poem

The breeze is high on the lonely shores
Of Massachusetts Bay;
The storm-swept ocean loudly roars,
And foams with dashing spray.

The coast is clad with drifted snow,
The forest stripp'd of bloom,
And sky above and earth below
Are wrapp'd in winter's gloom.

The panther springs from his secret lair,
The wolves at midnight howl;
And the frightened deer swiftly cuts the air,
As she flies at their horrid growl.

Away from the shore is a cabin of bark,
Where the Indian hunter dwells;
But a shout comes over the breezes; hark!
'Tis the Indian warrior's yells!

Those hostile tribes, in their deadly hate,
Have drenched the earth with blood,
And the valley now is desolate
Where once the wigwam stood.

The wind is high on the lonely shores
Of the Massachusetts Bay,
The skies are dark and the ocean roars
Mid foaming heaps of spray.

But whence is that vessel now booming in sight,
On the distant Eastern waves?
Have her crew come hither to join in the fight,
And to find their lonely graves?

Or seek they for fame, or dominion, or gold,
In ambition's mad career?
Say whence are those strangers, so venturous and bold,
And what is their objecThere?

That vessel is come from a stormy land,
By persecution driven;
And her crew are a holy, pilgrim band,
In the special care of heaven.

They came not to join in the savage fight,
Nor hither for fame did they flee;
But they came to enjoy the sacred right
Of religious liberty.

They came to seek for an humble abode,
And erect a peaceful home,
Where a martyr's blood had never flow'd,
Nor persecution come.

They came for a refuge from vice and crime;
They came to escape from death,
As the ark was preserved, in the olden time,
From the drowning world beneath.

And now their boat, by the tempest toss'd,
Approached the dreary strand,
Till the storm-beaten rock of Plymouth's coast
Received them safe on land.

The sun is rising on the shores
Of the Massachusetts Bay,
And o'er the verdant landscape pours
The radiant beams of day.

But throughout its course from east to west,
O'er all the nations borne,
It shines on no country more happy and blest
Than here salutes the morn.

And long in ten thousand hearts of bliss
Will the blood of the pilgrims flow,
Who fled to this dreary wilderness
Two hundred years ago.