The Liberty Minstrel Part 5

Whilst they the oppressors of millions could be.

They can feel for themselves, for the Pole they can feel, Towards Afric's children their hearts are like steel; They are deaf to their call, to their wrongs they are blind; In error they slumber nor seek truth to find.

Though scorn and oppression on our pathway attend, Despised and reviled, we the slave will befriend; Our Father, thy blessing! we look but to thee, Nor cease from our labors till all shall be free.

Should mobs in their fury with missiles a.s.sail, The cause it is righteous, the truth will prevail; Then heed not their clamors, though loud they proclaim That freedom shall slumber, and slavery reign.

THE FUGITIVE SLAVE TO THE CHRISTIAN.

Words by Elizur Wright, jr. Music arranged from Cracovienne.

[Music]

The fetters galled my weary soul,-- A soul that seemed but thrown away; I spurned the tyrant's base control, Resolved at last the man to play:--

Chorus.

The hounds are baying on my track; O Christian! will you send me back?

The hounds are baying on my track; O Christian! will you send me back?

I felt the stripes, the lash I saw, Red, dripping with a father's gore; And, worst of all their lawless law, The insults that my mother bore!

The hounds are baying on my track, O Christian! will you send me back?

Where human law o'errules Divine, Beneath the sheriff's hammer fell My wife and babes,--I call them mine,-- And where they suffer, who can tell?

The hounds are baying on my track, O Christian! will you send me back?

I seek a home where man is man, If such there be upon this earth, To draw my kindred, if I can, Around its free, though humble hearth.

The hounds are baying on my track, O Christian! will you send me back!

The Strength of Tyranny.

The tyrant's chains are only strong While slaves submit to wear them; And, who could bind them on the strong, Determined not to wear them?

Then clank your chains, e'en though the links Were light as fas.h.i.+on's feather: The heart which rightly feels and thinks Would cast them altogether.

The lords of earth are only great While others clothe and feed them!

But what were all their pride and state Should labor cease to heed them?

The swain is higher than a king: Before the laws of nature, The monarch were a useless thing, The swain a useless creature.

We toil, we spin, we delve the mine, Sustaining each his neighbor; And who can hold a right divine To rob us of our labor?

We rush to battle--bear our lot In every ill and danger-- And who shall make the peaceful cot To homely joy a stranger?

Perish all tyrants far and near, Beneath the chains that bind us; And perish too that servile fear Which makes the slaves they find us: One grand, one universal claim-- One peal of moral thunder-- One glorious burst in Freedom's name, And rend our bonds asunder!

THE BLIND SLAVE BOY.

Words by Mrs. Dr. Bailey. Music arranged from Sweet Afton.

[Music]

Come back to me mother! why linger away From thy poor little blind boy, the long weary day!

I mark every footstep, I list to each tone, And wonder my mother should leave me alone!

There are voices of sorrow, and voices of glee, But there's no one to joy or to sorrow with me; For each hath of pleasure and trouble his share, And none for the poor little blind boy will care.

My mother, come back to me! close to thy breast Once more let thy poor little blind one be pressed; Once more let me feel thy warm breath on my cheek, And hear thee in accents of tenderness speak!

O mother! I've no one to love me--no heart Can bear like thine own in my sorrows a part, No hand is so gentle, no voice is so kind, Oh! none like a mother can cherish the blind!

Poor blind one! No mother thy wailing can hear, No mother can hasten to banish thy fear; For the slave-owner drives her, o'er mountain and wild, And for one paltry dollar hath sold thee, poor child!

Ah! who can in language of mortals reveal The anguish that none but a mother can feel, When man in his vile l.u.s.t of mammon hath trod On her child, who is stricken and smitten of G.o.d!

Blind, helpless, forsaken, with strangers alone, She hears in her anguish his piteous moan; As he eagerly listens--but listens in vain, To catch the loved tones of his mother again!

The curse of the broken in spirit shall fall On the wretch who hath mingled this wormwood and gall, And his gain like a mildew shall blight and destroy, Who hath torn from his mother the little blind boy!

SLAVE'S WRONGS.

Words by Miss Chandler. Arranged from "Rose of Allandale."

[Music]

With aching brow and wearied limb, The slave his toil pursued; And oft I saw the cruel scourge Deep in his blood imbrued; He tilled oppression's soil where men For liberty had bled, And the eagle wing of Freedom waved In mockery, o'er his head.

The earth was filled with the triumph shout Of men who had burst their chains; But his, the heaviest of them all, Still lay on his burning veins; In his master's hall there was luxury, And wealth, and mental light; But the very book of the Christian law, Was hidden from his sight.

In his master's halls there was wine and mirth, And songs for the newly free; But his own low cabin was desolate Of all but misery.

He felt it all--and to bitterness His heart within him turned; While the panting wish for liberty, Like a fire in his bosom burned.

The haunting thought of his wrongs grew changed To a darker and fiercer hue, Till the horrible shape it sometimes wore At last familiar grew; There was darkness all within his heart, And madness in his soul; And the demon spark, in his bosom nursed, Blazed up beyond control.

Then came a scene! oh! such a scene!

I would I might forget The ringing sound of the midnight scream, And the hearth-stone redly wet!

The mother slain while she shrieked in vain For her infant's threatened life; And the flying form of the frighted child, Struck down by the b.l.o.o.d.y knife.

There's many a heart that yet will start From its troubled sleep, at night, As the horrid form of the vengeful slave Comes in dreams before the sight.

The slave was crushed, and his fetters' link Drawn tighter than before; And the b.l.o.o.d.y earth again was drenched With the streams of his flowing gore.

Ah! know they not, that the tightest band Must burst with the wildest power?-- That the more the slave is oppressed and wronged, Will be fiercer his rising hour?