"Still wait and watch; the way prepare
Where I with folded wings of prayer
May follow, weaponless and bare."

"Too late!" the stern, sad voice replied,
"Too late!" its mournful echo sighed,
In low lament the answer died.

A rustling as of wings in flight,
An upward gleam of lessening white,
So passed the vision, sound and sight.

But round me, like a silver bell
Rung down the listening sky to tell
Of holy help, a sweet voice fell.

"Still hope and trust," it sang; "the rod
Must fall, the wine-press must be trod,
But all is possible with God!"

1862.

TO ENGLISHMEN.

Written when, in the stress of our terrible war, the English ruling
class, with few exceptions, were either coldly indifferent or hostile to
the party of freedom. Their attitude was illustrated by caricatures of
America, among which was one of a slaveholder and cowhide, with the
motto, "Haven't I a right to wallop my nigger?"

You flung your taunt across the wave
We bore it as became us,
Well knowing that the fettered slave
Left friendly lips no option save
To pity or to blame us.

You scoffed our plea. "Mere lack of will,
Not lack of power," you told us
We showed our free-state records; still
You mocked, confounding good and ill,
Slave-haters and slaveholders.

We struck at Slavery; to the verge
Of power and means we checked it;
Lo!--presto, change! its claims you urge,
Send greetings to it o'er the surge,
And comfort and protect it.

But yesterday you scarce could shake,
In slave-abhorring rigor,
Our Northern palms for conscience' sake
To-day you clasp the hands that ache
With "walloping the nigger!"

O Englishmen!--in hope and creed,
In blood and tongue our brothers!
We too are heirs of Runnymede;
And Shakespeare's fame and Cromwell's deed
Are not alone our mother's.

"Thicker than water," in one rill
Through centuries of story
Our Saxon blood has flowed, and still
We share with you its good and ill,
The shadow and the glory.

Joint heirs and kinfolk, leagues of wave
Nor length of years can part us
Your right is ours to shrine and grave,
The common freehold of the brave,
The gift of saints and martyrs.

Our very sins and follies teach
Our kindred frail and h