e land of
yours?"

"Do you not know that poem?" asked David; and we could see, by the
moonlight, that there was something very like indignation at such
ignorance in his fine dark eyes.

"Hear it, then, and see if you do not call it poetry."

If you could only have seen him, Bennie, as he stood on the cliff, with
his rough, sailor-like hat in hand, and the breeze lifting his dark hair
from his broad forehead, while, looking with absolute fondness on the
scene around him, he repeated,--

"Hail to the land whereon we tread,
Our fondest boast!
The sepulchre of mighty dead,
The truest hearts that ever bled,
Who sleep on glory's brightest bed,
A fearless host;
No slave is here;--our unchained feet
Walk freely, as the waves that beat
Our coast.

"Our fathers crossed the ocean's wave
To seek this shore;
They left behind the coward slave
To welter in his living grave;
With hearts unbent, and spirits brave,
They sternly bore
Such toils as meaner souls had quelled;
But souls like these such toils impelled
To soar.

"Hail to the morn when first they stood
On Bunker's height,
And, fearless, stemmed the invading flood,
And wrote our dearest rights in blood,
And mowed in ranks the hireling brood,
In desperate fight!
O, 'twas a proud, exulting day,
For e'en our fallen fortunes lay
In light!

"There is no other land like thee,
No dearer shore;
Thou art the shelter of the free;
The home, the port, of liberty
Thou hast been, and shall for ever be,
Till time is o'er.
Ere I forget to think upon
My land, shall mother curse the son
She bore.

"Thou art the firm, unshaken rock
On which we rest;
And, rising from thy hardy stock,
Thy sons the tyrant's power shall mock,
And slavery's galling chains unlock,
And free the oppressed;
All who the wreath of freedom twine
Beneath the shadow of their vine
Are blest.

"We love thy rude and rocky shore,
And here we stand.
Let foreign navies hasten o'er,
And on our heads their fury pour,
And peal their cannon's loudest roar,
And storm our land;
They still shall find our lives are given
To die for home,--and leant on heaven
Our hand."

Did you think that a real Yankee could be so proud of living out of
Virginia? I am sure those we have seen appear to be half ashamed of
their country,--and to b