And not the finer essence gone.

Thou, stranger that shalt come this way.
No fraud upon the dead commit--
Observe the swelling turf and say,
They do not _lie_, but here they _sit_.

Here still a lofty rock remains,
On which the curious eye may trace
(Now wasted half by wearing rains)
The fancies of a ruder race.

Here still an aged elm aspires,
Beneath whose far-projecting shade
(And which the shepherd still admires)
The children of the forest played.

There oft a restless Indian queen
(Pale Sheba with her braided hair),
And many a barbarous form is seen
To chide the man that lingers there.

By midnight moons, o'er moistening dews,
In vestments for the chase arrayed,
The hunter still the deer pursues,
The hunter and the deer--a shade!

And long shall timorous Fancy see
The painted chief and pointed spear,
And Reason's self shall bow the knee
To shadows and delusions here.

DANIEL WEBSTER.

THE UNION.

[From the _Reply to Hayne_, January 25, 1830.]

I profess, sir, in my career hitherto, to have kept steadily in view
the prosperity and honor of the whole country, and the preservation of
our Federal Union. It is to that Union we owe our safety at home and
our consideration and dignity abroad. It is to that Union that we are
chiefly indebted for whatever makes us most proud of our country. That
Union we readied only by the discipline of our virtues in the severe
school of adversity. It had its origin in the necessities of
disordered finance, prostrate commerce, and ruined credit. Under its
benign influences these great interests immediately awoke as from the
dead and sprang forth with newness of life. Every year of its duration
has teemed with fresh proofs of its utility and its blessings; and
although our territory has stretched out wider and wider and our
population spread farther and farther, they have not outrun its
protection or its benefits. It has been to us all a copious fountain
of national, social, and personal happiness.

I have not allowed myself, sir, to look beyond the Union to see what
might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed
the chances of preserving liberty when the bonds that unite us together
shall be broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hang over the
precipice of disunion to see whether with my short sight I can fathom
the depth of the abyss below, nor