Ballads and
Other Poems

Ballads
AND
OTHER POEMS

BY
GEORGE LANSING RAYMOND

FOURTH EDITION, REVISED

G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS

NEW YORK AND LONDON
The Knickerbocker Press

“BALLADS OF THE REVOLUTION”
Copyright, 1886
by
GEORGE LANSING RAYMOND

“SKETCHES IN SONG”
Copyright, 1887
by
GEORGE LANSING RAYMOND

Third Edition, Copyright, 1908
by
GEORGE LANSING RAYMOND

Fourth Edition, Copyright, 1916
by
GEORGE LANSING RAYMOND

Made in the United States of America

CONTENTS.

BALLADS OF THE REVOLUTION.

REPRESENTING THE SPIRIT AND REASONS
LEADING TO THE
AMERICAN WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE.

Third Edition, Revised.

Ballads of the Revolution.[1]

OUR FIRST BREAK WITH THE BRITISH.

1765.

Great Britain’s lords[2] were planning—

So ran the world’s report—

To tax the colonies more and more,[4]

And treat our sires as if they wore

The liveries at the court.

“The colonies’ hope is union,”

Said Franklin,[3] by and by;

“Not one of them that stands alone

Can hold its own against the throne.

We[3] join,” he wrote, “or die.”

And “Freedom[4] is a birthright

Our fathers handed down;

Blood-bought,” James Otis[4] boldly said:

“One king of theirs it cost his head;

And one his throne and crown.[5]

“Were we to lose it, England

Would share in our mishap[6];

For not a net can harm us here,

But threatens every English peer,

Whom yet it may entrap.

“Our laws are in our charters

For scores of years enjoy’d;

Nor has the King, or Parliament,

Or both without our own consent

The power to make them void.[5]

“By them, the Magna Charta,

And all our Saxon rights;

By claims of nature, mind, descent,

We ought to send to Parliament[7]

And show it what it slights.”

A protest then we sent it.[7]

But back came sail on sail;[8]

And less had leaves of law-books grave

Torn out and flung to wind and wave

Shown law could not prevail.

They broke up our assembly;[9]

Supreme their army[10] made;

Removed the judge[11] who check’d their greed;

And on the church our fathers freed

The hands of bishops laid.[12]

“Shall we, whose fathers won us

Our rights, abide their loss?

Nay,” Mayhew said;[13] “though these to take

Our Pharoah’s hosts of red-coats make

Blood-red the sea they cross.

“The Lord o’errules the waters,

And He will guard our cause:

And Parliament—let Plymouth Rock

To whelm them all throw back the shock—

Will bid the tyrant pause.”

“God guide the House of Commons,”

We cried with lifted eyes.

God guided it and us, alas,

But how He scorch’d our heaven to pass

His finger through the skies!

The Commons framed the Stamp-Act.[14]

It legal writs refused,

And made our bargains go for naught,

Unless, in all we sold or bought,

Their stamps were bought and used.

“The stamps are only vouchers,”

Wrote Green,[15] “to license knaves!”

“To tax, against their own consent,

Where none,” said Adams,[16] “represent

Our people, brands them slaves.”

“Our charter’d free assemblies,

To which our laws entrust[17]

The right to tax us, and to pay

Each crown-official,—only they

Can ever keep him just.”

Quoth Thomas Chase:[18] “They only!

But British agents curse

To find that our assemblies true

Have something nobler here to do

Than fill a noble’s purse.”

“The admiralty,” said Hancock,[21]

“To swell the navy’s pelf,

Have pass’d a law that it empowers[19]

To seek in every ship of ours

A bounty for itself.

“Would we dispute the seizure,

Our loss can be discuss’d

And righted but in England’s courts,[20]

And by a judge whom it supports;—

And that, they say, is just.

“No fleet of mine[21] shall carry

A stamp, though all I lose.

I choose, ere it, to save my soul!”

The whole land heard, and soon the whole

Had sworn no stamps to use.

New York had lived by commerce.

Her merchants vow’d, they all,[22]

Ere stamps they bought, would sail no boats,

And sell no goods, and pass no notes—

They would not live in thrall.

Said Isaac Sears:[23] “No wonder

These human lords combine

The masses’ rivalling wealth to steal!

Let them be stript, my lord may feel

His decency divine.

“For years, to gild the peerage

Have England’s ports been made[24]

The marts by law for all we bought.—

Alas! in what that we have wrought

Have they not check’d our trade?

“The nobles, while their winnings

Like nuggets clog the sieve

That ours drop through, would not eschew

Their royal rule: ‘To others do

What makes them humbly live.’

“And shall we not live humbly

Who but our pride restrain?

And buy at home more homely goods?”—

“Buy homespun!”[25] rang from bay to woods.

Then rang the looms[25] amain.

But keen and crafty tories,

They prowl’d around at night,

And plotted long, and bought and sold,

And hoax’d and coax’d the young and old

Their homespun league to slight.[26]

“We must not wait till England

Shall send the stamps,” wrote Edes.[27]

“Once let our tories own a few,

They soon were sown the whole land through

To grow like seeds of weeds.”

The Boston Stamp-man’s image

Men burn’d before his face.

Their roars, like thunder, threaten’d storm;

And torches flash’d; the air was warm;

The man resign’d his place.

“Resign!” erelong the echo

Had roll’d to every town.[28]

None dared resist the people’s plea,

And none dared hold a stamp, or be

The stamp-man of the crown.

“Our governors,” growl’d the tories,

“Will sell the stamps to us.”

The governors vow’d this course to take;[29]

But we, we vow’d, our lives the stake,

They should not thwart us thus.

The night before the Stamp-Act

Should rule the colony,

We slept not much; we melted lead;

We whetted steel; we plann’d ahead,

We “Sons of Liberty.”[30]

Then, when the morn was breaking,[31]

On every hill and plain,

In all the towns, we toll’d the bells,[31]

That all began with doleful knells,

As though for Freedom slain.

Anon, they rang out madly[31]

What might have peal’d to be

The land’s alarm-bell—only now

They peal’d to hail the new-born vow

Of men that would be free.

New York went wild to hear them.[32]

Men flooded every way:

They left their shops; they stopt their mills;

And farmers flock’d from all the hills,

And sailors from the bay.

Now who would buy a stamp here?

Was ask’d in all the ways.

But not a shop was not shut to;

For all had wiser work to do

On this, our day of days.

“We would not, and we will not

Submit,” said Isaac Sears.[33]

The governor said: “You fill the street,

But here a fort and there a fleet

May yet awake your fears.”

“Our stamps,” cried James,[34] his major,

“Our stamps, if loaded down

Our cannon here, and scatter’d thence

Among the crowd, would soon commence

To circulate in town.”

“Aha,” said Sears in answer,

“For this you soldiers came?

For this our wily governor here

Pretended border wars to fear—[35]

Aha, were we his game?

“To tax us indirectly,—

Was it for this, the crown

Bade your imported troopers make

Our town[35] support you?—for the sake

Of being thus kept down?

“To kill our leaders, was it,

The crown made them be rank’d

By Braddock’s braggarts, who could run

And leave a man like Washington[36]

By their commands outflank’d?

“Yes, yes, in genuine danger

We know who[37] win the day;

And whose the coin and blood we miss,

That, from our fathers’ time to this,

Have held our foes at bay.

“And need we now your army?

You know—your sovereign too,

Our wars are his—He[37] France attacks

And here her colony—when he lacks

Excuse for sending you.

“How strong, think you, our patience?

How long ere it shall tire?—

Ah, Britain’s lion’s whelp may get

So tough by cuffs like this, as yet

To turn and rend her sire!”

“Sheer treason!” cried the major;

And “Treason!” cried his chief.

Our spokesman’s eye their fury brook’d,

Then calmly toward his friends he look’d,

And gave his thoughts relief.

“Nay, theirs are loyal spirits,

But when the wrong is great,

And forms of law do not deserve

Their soul’s allegiance, then they serve

The spirit of the state.”

With this, he told those courtiers

Their words would he report.

They heard the people’s groans that rose

To greet the words he bore, and chose

To seek, near by, the fort.[38]

Then from the fort the cannon

Were turn’d upon the town.

But “If you fire,” the people cried,

“We hang the governor here outside,

Or burn your quarters down.”

The governor urged his honor;

“Had pledged,” he said, “his oath,”[39]

And ought to further Britain’s aims.“—

We thought New York had equal claims

On oath and honor both.[39]

“And let him pledge his honor

To let the stamps alone,”

Said Isaac Sears; and all the crowd

Who heard him say it, shouted loud

To make his words their own.

The people waited long then,

And hoped the strife would end;

But, when this course had nothing won,

No man[40] could check a course begun

The governor’s will to bend.

At night, the boys with torches

Came trooping out for sport.

They sought the house of James,[41] and took

The army flags his fear forsook,

And march’d them round the fort.

The governor own’d his coaches,

And one a coach of state.

They burst his barn-door in with cries[42]

And dragg’d them off before his eyes,

As trophies of their hate.

An image of the devil,

And of the governor too[42]

They made, and made them both careen,

While, side by side, through Bowling Green,

They wheel’d them into view.

At last, of all the coaches

They form’d a funeral pyre;

And, full in face of all the town,

Who only roar’d its roar to drown,

They set the whole on fire.

Then came a wake and wailing,

As ashes cover’d all;

And not a clause in laws unjust

The man had thought on us to thrust

But some one would recall.

“A foe[43] is he of England!”

“A foe to all of us!”

“In Scotland went with Jacobites!”

“Has vow’d to murder here our rights!—

Ere that we toast him thus!”

The colony’s council[44] pass’d then

A vote opposed by none,—

That England had the stamps assign’d

To agents who had all resign’d,