mounds

A wilder hunting-ground. The beaver builds No longer by these streams, but far away, On waters whose blue surface ne'er gave back

The white man's face springs,

among Missouri's

And pools whose issues swell the Oregon He rears his little Venice. In these plains The bison feeds no more. Twice twenty leagues

Beyond remotest smoke of hunter's camp, Roams the majestic brute, in herds that shake

100

The earth with thundering steps - yet here I meet

His ancient footprints stamped beside the pool.

Still this great solitude is quick with life. Myriads of insects, gaudy as the flowers They flutter over, gentle quadrupeds, And birds, that scarce have learned the fear of man,

Are here, and sliding reptiles of the ground, Startlingly beautiful. The graceful deer Bounds to the wood at my approach. The bee,

A more adventurous colonist than man, 110

HERE are old trees, tall oaks, and gnarlèd pines,

That stream with gray-green mosses; here the ground

Was never trenched by spade, and flowers spring up

Unsown, and die ungathered. It is sweet To linger here, among the flitting birds And leaping squirrels, wandering brooks, and winds

That shake the leaves, and scatter, as they pass,

A fragrance from the cedars, thickly set With pale-blue berries. In these peaceful shades

Peaceful, unpruned, immeasurably old — 10 My thoughts go up the long dim path of

To tend the quiet flock and watch the stars, And teach the reed to utter simple airs. Thou by his side, amid the tangled wood, Didst war upon the panther and the wolf, His only foes; and thou with him didst draw

The earliest furrow on the mountain-side, Soft with the deluge. Tyranny himself, Thy enemy, although of reverend look, Hoary with many years, and far obeyed, Is later born than thou; and as he meets The grave defiance of thine elder eye, The usurper trembles in his fastnesses.

40

There's freedom at thy gates and rest
For Earth's down-trodden and opprest,
A shelter for the hunted head,
For the starved laborer toil and bread.
Power, at thy bounds,
Stops and calls back his baffled hounds.

O fair young mother! on thy brow
Shall sit a nobler grace than now.
Deep in the brightness of the skies
The thronging years in glory rise,
And, as they fleet,

Drop strength and riches at thy feet.

Thine eye, with every coming hour,
Shall brighten, and thy form shall tower;
And when thy sisters, elder born,
Would brand thy name with words

30

40

of

1847.

THE PLANTING OF THE APPLE

TREE

COME, let us plant the apple-tree. Cleave the tough greensward with the spade;

Wide let its hollow bed be made;
There gently lay the roots, and there
Sift the dark mould with kindly care,
And press it o'er them tenderly,

As, round the sleeping infant's feet,
We softly fold the cradle-sheet;

So plant we the apple-tree.

What plant we in this apple-tree? Buds, which the breath of summer days Shall lengthen into leafy sprays;

10

Boughs where the thrush, with crimson breast,

Shall haunt and sing and hide her nest;
We plant, upon the sunny lea,

A shadow for the noontide hour,
A shelter from the summer shower,
When we plant the apple-tree.

What plant we in this apple-tree?
Sweets for a hundred flowery springs
To load the May-wind's restless wings,
When, from the orchard-row, he pours
Its fragrance through our open doors;

A world of blossoms for the bee,
Flowers for the sick girl's silent room,
For the glad infant sprigs of bloom,
We plant with the apple-tree.

What plant we in this apple-tree?
Fruits that shall swell in sunny June,
And redden in the August noon,
And drop, when gentle airs come by,
That fan the blue September sky,

20

30

While children come, with cries of glee,

And seek them where the fragrant grass
Betrays their bed to those who pass,
At the foot of the apple-tree.

Each year shall give this apple-tree
A broader flush of roseate bloom,
A deeper maze of verdurous gloom,
And loosen, when the frost-clouds lower,
The crisp brown leaves in thicker shower.
The years shall come and pass, but we
Shall hear no longer, where we lie,
The summer's songs, the autumn's sigh,
In the boughs of the apple-tree.

And time shall waste this apple-tree.
Oh, when its aged branches throw
Thin shadows on the ground below,
Shall fraud and force and iron will
Oppress the weak and helpless still?

What shall the tasks of mercy be,
Amid the toils, the strifes, the tears
Of those who live when length of years
Is wasting this little apple-tree?

'Who planted this old apple-tree?'
The children of that distant day
Thus to some aged man shall say;
And, gazing on its mossy stem,

The gray-haired man shall answer them:
A poet of the land was he,

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70

Born in the rude but good old times; "T is said he made some quaint old rhymes, On planting the apple-tree.'1

1849.

ROBERT OF LINCOLN

81

1864.

MERRILY Swinging on brier and weed,
Near to the nest of his little dame,
Over the mountain-side or mead,
Robert of Lincoln is telling his name:
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,
Spink, spank, spink;

Snug and safe is that nest of ours,
Hidden among the summer flowers.
Chee, chee, chee.

1 Compare a letter of Bryant's written November 17, 1846 (Godwin's Life of Bryant, vol. ii, pp. 27, 28): I have been, and am, at my place on Long Island, planting and transplanting trees, in the mist; sixty or seventy; some for shade; most for fruit. Hereafter, men, whose existence is at present merely possible, will gather pears from the trees which I have set in the ground, and wonder what old covey-for in those days the slang terms of the present time, by the ordinary process of change in languages, will have become classical-what old covey of past ages planted them? Or they will walk in the shade of the mulberry, apricot, and cherry trees that I have set in a row beside a green lane, and think, if they think at all about the matter -for who can tell what the great-grandchildren of ours will think about that they sprang up of themselves by the way.'