THE SLAVE IN THE DISMAL

SWAMP.

IN laik fens of the Dismal Swamp
The hunted Negro lay;

He saw the fire of the midnight camp.

And heard at times a horse's tramp

And a bloodhound's distant bay.

Where will-o'-the wisps and glowworms shine,

In bulrush and in brake;

Where waving mosses shroud the pine,

And the cedar grows, and the poisonous vine

Is spotted like the snake;

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THE SLAVE IN THE DISMAL SWAMP. 283

Where hardly a human foot could pass.
Or a human heart would dare,

On the quaking turf of the green morass

He crouched in the rank and tangled

grass

Like a wild beast in his lair.

A poor old slave, infirm and lame;

Great scars deformed his face;

On his forehead he bore the brand of shame. And the rags, that hid his mangled frame, Were the livery of disgrace.

All things above were bright and fair,
All things were glad and free;
Lithe squirrels darted here and there,
And wild birds filled the echoing air

With songs of Liberty!

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On him alone was the doom of pain.

From the morning of his birth;

On him alone the curse of Cain

Fell, like a flail on the garnered grain,

And struck him to the earth i

THE SLAVE SINGING AT MID

NIGHT.

LOUD he sang the psalm of David:

He, a Negro and enslaved,

Sang of Israel's victory,

Sang of Zion, bright and free.

In that hour, when night is calmest, Sang he from the Hebrew Psalmist In a voice so sweet and clear

That I could not choose but hear.

Songs of triumph, and ascriptions. Such as reached the swart Egyptians, When upon the Red Sea coast

Perished Pharaoh and his host.

And the voice of his devotion

Filled my south strange emotion;

For its tones by turns were glad,
Sweetly solemn, wi1y sad.

Paul and Silas, ir the'r prison,
Sarg of Christ the Lord arisen,
And an ea thquake's arm of might
Broke their dungeon-gates at night.

But, alas what holy angel

Brings the Slave this glad evangel? And what earthquake's arm of might Breaks his dunge n-gates at night?