Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE BRITISH PRISON-SHIP, by PHILIP FRENEAU



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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE BRITISH PRISON-SHIP, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Amid these ills no tyrant dared refuse
Last Line: And his last efforts more than damn the first.
Subject(s): American Revolution; Hospitals; Navy - Great Britain; Prisons & Prisoners; Sea Battles; English Navy; Convicts; Naval Warfare


Amid these ills no tyrant dared refuse
My right to pen the dictates of the muse
To paint the of the infernal place,
And fiends from Europe, insolent as base.




CANTO I. -- The Capture.

ASSIST me, CLIO! while in verse I tell
The dire misfortunes that a ship befell,
Which outward bound, to St. Eustatia's shore,
Death and disaster through the billows bore.

From Philadelphia's happy port she came;
(And there the builder planned her lofty frame,)
With wonderous skill, and excellence of art
He formed, disposed, and ordered every part,
With joy, beheld the stately fabric rise
To a stout bulwark, of stupendous size,
'Till launched at last, capacious of the freight,
He left her to the pilots, and her fate.

First, from her depths the tapering masts ascend,
On whose tall bulk the transverse yards depend,
By shrouds and stays secured from side to side
Trees grew on trees, suspended o'er the tide:
Firm to the yards extended, broad and vast,
They hung the sails, susceptive of the blast,
Far o' er the prow the lengthy bowsprit lay,
Supporting on the extreme the taut fore-stay,
Twice ten six pounders, at their port holes placed,
And ranged in rows, stood hostile in the waist:
Thus all prepared, impatient for the seas,
She left her station with an adverse breeze,
This her first outset from her native shore,
To seas a stranger, and untryed before.

From the fine radiance, that his glories spread,
Ere from the east gay Phoebus lifts his head,
From the bright morn, a kindred name she won,
AURORA called, the daughter of the sun,
Whose form, projecting, the broad prow displays,
Far glittering o'er the wave, a mimic blaze.

The gay ship now, in all her pomp and pride,
With sails expanded, flew along the tide;
'Twas thy deep stream, O Delaware, that bore
This pile intended for a southern shore,
Bound to those isles where endless summer reigns,
Fair fruits, gay blossoms, and enamelled plains;
Where sloping lawns the roving swain invite;
And the cool morn succeeds the breezy night,
Where each glad day a heaven unclouded brings
And sky-topt mountains teem with golden springs.

From Cape HENLOPEN, urged by favouring gales,
When morn emerged, we sea-ward spread our sails,
Then, east-south-east, explored the briny way,
Close to the wind, departing from the bay;
No longer seen the hoarse resounding strand,
With hearts elate we hurried from the land,
Escaped the dangers of that shelving ground
To sailors fatal, and for wrecks renowned --

The gale increases as we plough the main,
Now scarce the hills their sky-blue mist retain:
At last they sink beneath the rolling wave,
That seems their summits, as they sink, to lave.
Abaft the beam the freshening breezes play,
No mists advancing, to deform the day,
No tempests rising o'er the splendid scene,
A sea unruffled, and a heaven serene.

Now Sol's bright lamp, the heaven-born source of light,
Had passed the line of his meridian height,
And westward hung -- retreating from the view
Shores disappeared, and every hill withdrew,
When, still suspicious of some neighbouring foe,
Aloft the Master bade a seaman go,
To mark if, from the mast's aspiring height,
Through all the round, a vessel came in sight.

Too soon the seaman's glance extending wide,
Far distant in the east a ship espyed,
Her lofty masts stood bending to the gale,
Close to the wind was braced each shivering sail;
Next from the deck we saw the approaching foe,
Her spangled bottom seemed in flames to glow
When to the winds she bowed in dreadful haste
And her lee-guns lay deluged in the waist;
From her top-gallant waved an English Jack; --
With all her might she strove to gain our tack,
Nor strove in vain -- with pride and power elate,
Winged on by winds, she drove us to our fate,
No stop, no stay her bloody crew intends,
(So flies a comet with its host of fiends)
Nor oaths, nor prayers arrest her swift career,
Death in her front, and ruin in her rear.

Struck at the sight, the master gave command
To change our course, and steer toward the land --
Straight to the task the ready sailors run,
And while the word was uttered, half was done;
As, from the south, the fiercer breezes rise
Swift from her foe alarmed AURORA flies,
With every sail extended to the wind
She fled the unequal foe that chaced behind. --
Along her decks, disposed in close array,
Each at its port, the grim artillery lay,
Soon on the foe with brazen throat to roar;
But, small their size, and narrow was their bore;
Yet, faithful, they their destined station keep
To guard the barque that wafts them o'er the deep,
Who now must bend to steer a homeward course
And trust her swiftness rather than her force,
Unfit to combat with a powerful foe;
Her decks too open, and her waist too low.

While o'er the wave, with foaming prow, she flies,
Once more emerging, distant landscapes rise;
High in the air the starry streamer plays,
And every sail its various tribute pays;
To gain the land, we bore the weighty blast;
And now the wished for cape appeared at last;
But the vext foe, impatient of delay,
Prepared for ruin, pressed upon his prey;
Near, and more near, in aweful grandeur came
The frigate IRIS, not unknown to fame;
IRIS her name, but HANCOCK once she bore,
Framed and completed on NEW ALBION'S shore,
By MANLY lost, the swiftest of the train
That fly with wings of canvas o'er the main.

Then, while for combat some with zeal prepare,
Thus to the heavens the Boatswain sent his prayer:
"List' all ye powers that rule the skies and seas!
"Shower down perdition on such thieves as these,
"Winds, daunt their hearts with terror and dismay,
"And sprinkle on their powder salt sea spray!
"May bursting cannon, while his aim he tries,
"Distract the gunner, and confound his eyes --
"The chief that awes the quarter-deck, may he
"Tripped from his stand, be tumbled in the sea.
"May they who rule the round-top's giddy height
"Be canted headlong to perpetual night;
"May fiends torment them on a leeward coast,
"And help forsake them when they want it most --
"From their wheeled engines torn be every gun --
"And now, to sum up every curse in one,
"May latent flames, to save us, intervene,
"And hell-ward drive them from their magazine!"

The Frigate, now, had every sail unfurled,
And rushed tremendous o'er the watery world;
Thus fierce Pelides, eager to destroy,
Chaced the proud Trojan to the gates of Troy --
Swift o'er the waves while, hostile, they pursue,
As swiftly from their fangs AURORA flew,
At length HENLOPEN'S cape we gained once more,
And vainly strove to force the ship ashore;
Stern fate forbade the barren shore to gain;
Denial sad, and source of future pain!
For then the inspiring breezes ceased to blow,
Lost were they all, and smoothed the seas below;
By the broad cape becalmed, our lifeless sails
No longer swelled their bosoms to the gales;
The ship, unable to pursue her way,
Tumbling about, at her own guidance lay,
No more the helm its wonted influence lends,
No oars assist us, and no breeze befriends;
Mean time the foe, advancing from the sea,
Ranged her black cannon, pointed on our lee,
Then up she luffed, and blazed her entrails dire,
Bearing destruction, terror, death, and fire.
Vext at our fate, we primed a piece, and then
Returned the shot, to shew them we were men.

Dull night at length her dusky pinions spread,
And every hope to 'scape the foe was fled,
Close to thy cape, Henlopen, though we pressed,
We could not gain thy desert, dreary breast;
Though ruined trees beshroud thy barren shore
With mounds of sand half hid, or covered o'er,
Though ruffian winds disturb thy summit bare,
Yet every hope and every wish was there:
In vain we sought to reach the joyless strand,
Fate stood between, and barred us from the land.

All dead becalmed, and helpless as we lay,
The ebbing current forced us back to sea,
While vengeful IRIS, thirsting for our blood,
Flashed her red lightnings o'er the trembling flood;
At every flash a storm of ruin came
'Till our shocked vessel shook through all her frame --
Mad for revenge, our breasts with fury glow
To wreak returns of vengeance on the foe;
Full at his hull our pointed guns we raised,
His hull resounded as the cannon blazed;
Through his broad sails while some a passage tore,
His sides re-echoed to the dreadful roar,
Alternate fires dispelled the shades of night --
But how unequal was this daring fight!
Our stoutest guns threw but a six-pound ball,
Twelve pounders from the foe our sides did maul;
And, while no power to save him intervenes,
A bullet struck our captain of marines;
Fierce, though he bid defiance to the foe
He felt his death and ruin in the blow,
Headlong he fell, distracted with the wound,
The deck distained, and heart blood streaming round.

Another blast, as fatal in its aim
Winged by destruction, through our rigging came,
And aimed aloft, to cripple in the fray,
Shrouds, stays, and braces tore at once away,
Sails, blocks, and oars in scattered fragments fly --
Their softest language was -- SUBMIT, OR DIE.

Repeated cries throughout the ship resound;
Now every bullet brought a different wound;
Twixt wind and water, one assailed the side:
Through this aperture rushed the briny tide --
'Twas then the Master trembled for his crew,
And bade thy shores, O Delaware, adieu! --
And must we yield to yon' destructive ball,
And must our colours to these ruffians fall! --
They fall! -- his thunders forced our strength to bend,
The lofty topsails, with their yards, descend,
And the proud foe, such leagues of ocean passed,
His wish completed in our woe at last.

Conveyed to YORK, we found, at length, too late,
That Death was better than the prisoner's fate,
There doomed to famine, shackles, and despair,
Condemned to breathe a foul, infected air
In sickly hulks, devoted while we lay,
Successive funerals gloomed each dismal day --
But what on captives British rage can do,
Another Canto, friends, shall let you know.



CANTO II. -- The Prison-Ships.

THE various horrors of these hulks to tell,
These Prison Ships where pain and penance dwell,
Where death in tenfold vengeance holds his reign,
And injured ghosts, yet unavenged, complain;
This be my task -- ungenerous Britons, you
Conspire to murder whom you can't subdue. --

That Britain's rage should dye our plains with gore,
And desolation spread through every shore,
None e'er could doubt, that her ambition knew, --
This was to rage and disappointment due;
But that those legions whom our soil maintained,
Who first drew breath in this devoted land,
Like famished wolves, should on their country prey,
Assist its foes, and wrest our lives away,
This shocks belief -- and bids our soil disown
Such knaves, subservient to a bankrupt throne.
By them the widow mourns her partner dead,
Her mangled sons to darksome prisons led,
By them -- and hence my keenest sorrows rise,
My friend -- companion -- my Orestes dies
Still for that loss must wretched I complain,
And sad Ophelia mourn her loss -- in vain!

Ah! come the day when from this bleeding shore
Fate shall remove them, to return no more --
To scorched Bahama shall the traitors go
With grief, and rage, and unremitting woe,
On burning sands to walk their painful round,
And sigh through all the solitary ground,
Where no gay flower their haggard eyes shall see,
And find no shade -- but from the cypress tree.

So much we suffered from the tribe I hate,
So near they shoved us to the brink of fate,
When two long months in these dark hulks we lay
Barred down by night, and fainting all the day
In the fierce fervours of the solar beam,
Cooled by no breeze on Hudson's mountain-stream;
That not unsung these threescore days shall fall
To black oblivion that would cover all! --

No masts or sails these crowded ships adorn,
Dismal to view, neglected and forlorn;
Here, mighty ills oppressed the imprisoned throng,
Dull were our slumbers, and our nights were long --
From morn to eve along the decks we lay
Scorched into fevers by the solar ray;
No friendly awning cast a welcome shade,
Once was it promised, and was never made;
No favours could these sons of death bestow,
'Twas endless vengeance, and unceasing woe:
Immortal hatred does their breasts engage,
And this lost empire swells their souls with rage.

Two hulks on Hudson's stormy bosom lie,
Two, on the east, alarm the pitying eye --
There, the black SCORPION at her mooring rides,
There, STROMBOLO swings, yielding to the tides;
Here, bulky JERSEY fills a larger space,
And HUNTER, to all hospitals disgrace --

Thou, SCORPION, fatal to thy crowded throng,
Dire theme of horror and Plutonian song,
Requir'st my lay -- thy sultry decks I know,
And all the torments that exist below!
The briny wave that Hudson's bosom fills
Drained through her bottom in a thousand rills:
Rotten and old, replete with sighs and groans,
Scarce on the waters she sustained her bones;
Here, doomed to toil, or founder in the tide,
At the moist pumps incessantly we plyed,
Here, doomed to starve, like famished dogs, we tore
The scant allowance, that our tyrants bore.

Remembrance shudders at this scene of fears --
Still in my view some tyrant chief appears,
Some base-born Hessian slave walks threatening by,
Some servile Scot, with murder in his eye,
Still haunts my sight, as vainly they bemoan
Rebellions managed so unlike their own!
O may we never feel the poignant pain
To live subjected to such fiends again,
Stewards and Mates, that hostile Britain bore,
Cut from the gallows on their native shore;
Their ghastly looks and vengeance-beaming eyes
Still to my view in dismal visions rise --
O may I ne'er review these dire abodes,
These piles for slaughter, floating on the floods, --
And you, that o'er the troubled ocean go,
Strike not your standards to this venomed foe,
Better the greedy wave should swallow all,
Better to meet the death-conducting ball,
Better to sleep on ocean s oozy bed,
At once destroyed and numbered with the dead,
Than thus to perish in the face of day
Where twice ten thousand deaths one death delay.

When to the ocean sinks the western sun,
And the scorched Tories fire their evening gun,
"Down, rebels, down!" the angry Scotchmen cry,
"Base dogs, descend, or by our broad swords die!"

Hail dark abode! what can with thee Compare --
Heat, sickness, famine, death, and stagnant air --
Pandora's box, from whence all mischiefs flew,
Here real found, torments mankind anew! --
Swift from the guarded decks we rushed along,
And vainly sought repose, so vast our throng
Four hundred wretches here, denied all light,
In crowded mansions pass the infernal night,
Some for a bed their tattered vestments join,
And some on chests, and some on floors recline;
Shut from the blessings of the evening air
Pensive we lay with mingled corpses there,
Meagre and wan, and scorched with heat, below,
We looked like ghosts, ere death had made us so --
How could we else, where heat and hunger joined,
Thus to debase the body and the mind, --
Where cruel thirst the parching throat invades,
Dries up the man, and fits him for the shades.

No waters laded from the bubbling spring
To these dire ships these little tyrants bring --
By plank and ponderous beams completely walled
In vain for water and in vain we called --
No drop was granted to the midnight prayer,
To rebels in these regions of despair! --
The loathsome cask a deadly dose contains,
Its poison circling through the languid veins;
" Here, generous Briton, generous, as you say,
"To my parched tongue one cooling drop convey,
"Hell has no mischief like a thirsty throat,
"Nor one tormentor like your David Sproat."

Dull passed the hours, till, from the East displayed,
Sweet morn dispelled the horrors of the shade;
On every side dire objects met the sight,
And pallid forms, and murders of the night, --
The dead were past their pain, the living groan,
Nor dare to hope another morn their own;
But what to them is morn's delightful ray?
Sad and distressful as the close of day;
O'er distant streams appears the dewy green,
And leafy trees on mountain tops are seen,
But they no groves nor grassy mountains tread,
Marked for a longer journey to the dead.

Black as the clouds, that shade St. Kilda's shore,
Wild as the winds, that round her mountains roar,
At every post some surly vagrant stands,
Culled from the English or the Hessian bands, --
Dispensing death triumphantly they stand,
Their musquets ready to obey command;
Wounds are their sport, as ruin is their aim;
On their dark souls compassion has no claim,
And discord only can their spirits please:
Such were our tyrants here, and such were these.

Ingratitude! no curse like thee is found
Throughout this jarring world's tumultuous round,
Their hearts with malice to our country swell
Because, in former days, we used them well! --
This pierces deep, too deeply wounds the breast;
We helped them naked, friendless, and distrest,
Received them, vagrants, with an open hand;
Bestowed them buildings, privilege, and land --
Behold the change! -- when angry Britain rose,
These thankless tribes became our fiercest foes,
By them devoted, plundered, and accurst,
Stung by the serpents, whom ourselves had nursed.

But such a train of endless woes abound,
So many mischiefs in these hulks are found,
That on them all a poem to prolong
Would swell too far the horrors of our song --
Hunger and thirst, to work our woe, combine,
And mouldy bread, and flesh of rotten swine:
The mangled carcase, and the battered brain,
The doctor's poison, and the captain's cane,
The soldier's musquet, and the steward's debt,
The evening shackle, and the noon-day threat.

That balm, destructive to the pangs of care,
Which Rome of old, nor Athens could prepare,
Which gains the day for many a modern chief
When cool reflection yields a faint relief,
That charm, whose virtue warms the world beside,
Was by these tyrants to our use denied;
While yet they deigned that healthsome balm to lade
The putrid water felt its powerful aid,
But when refused -- to aggravate our pains --
Then fevers raged and reveled through our veins;
Throughout my frame I felt its deadly heat,
I felt my pulse with quicker motions beat:
A pallid hue o'er every face was spread,
Unusual pains attacked the fainting head;
No physic here, no doctor to assist,
With oaths, they placed me on the sick man's list;
Twelve wretches more the same dark symptoms took,
And these were entered on the doctor's book;
The loathsome HUNTER was our destined place,
The HUNTER to all hospitals disgrace;
With soldiers, sent to guard us on our road,
Joyful we left the SCORPION'S dire abode;
Some tears we shed for the remaining crew,
Then cursed the hulk, and from her sides withdrew.



CANTO III. -- The Hospital Prison-Ship.

Now towards the HUNTER'S gloomy decks we came,
A slaughter-house, yet hospital in name;
For none came there, 'till ruined with their fees,
And half consumed, and dying of disease; --
But when too near, with labouring oars we plyed,
The Mate, with curses, drove us from the side;
That wretch who, banished from the navy crew,
Grown old in blood, did here his trade renew,
His rancorous tongue, when on his charge let loose,
Uttered reproaches, scandal, and abuse,
Gave all to hell, who dared his king disown,
And swore mankind were made for George alone.
A thousand times, to irritate our woe,
He wished us foundered in the gulph below;
A thousand times, he brandished high his stick,
And swore as often that we were not sick --
And yet so pale! -- that we were thought by some
A freight of ghosts, from death's dominions come --
But calmed at length -- for who can always rage,
Or the fierce war of boundless passion wage,
He pointed to the stairs that led below
To damps, disease, and varied shapes of woe --
Down to the gloom we took our pensive way,
Along the decks the dying captives lay;
Some struck with madness, some with scurvy pained,
But still of putrid fevers most complained!
On the hard floors these wasted objects laid,
There tossed and tumbled in the dismal shade,
There no soft voice their bitter fate bemoaned,
And death trode stately, while the victims groaned;
Of leaky decks I heard them long complain,
Drowned as they were in deluges of rain,
Denyed the comforts of a dying bed,
And not a pillow to support the head --
How could they else but pine, and grieve, and sigh,
Detest a wretched life -- and wish to die.

Scarce had I mingled with this dismal band
When a thin victim seized me by the hand --
"And art thou come," (death heavy on his eyes)
" And art thou come to these abodes," -- (he cries;)
"Why didst thou leave the Scorpion's dark retreat,
"And hither haste, a surer death to meet?
"Why didst thou leave thy damp infected cell? --
" If that was purgatory, this is hell --
"We, too, grown weary of that horrid shade
"Petitioned early for the doctor's aid;
"His aid denied, more deadly symptoms came,
"Weak, and yet weaker, glowed the vital flame;
"And when disease had worn us down so low
"That few could tell if we were ghosts, or no,
"And all asserted death would be our fate --
"Then to the doctor we were sent -- too late.
" Here wastes away Eurymedon the brave,
" Here young Palemon finds a watery grave,
"Here loved Alcander, now alas! no more,
" Dies, far sequestered from his native shore;
" He late, perhaps, too eager for the fray,
"Chaced the proud Briton o'er the watery way,
"'Till fortune, jealous, bade her clouds appear,
"Turned hostile to his fame, and brought him here,

"Thus do our warriors, thus our heroes fall,
"Imprisoned here, sure ruin meets them all,
" Or, sent afar to Britain's barbarous shore,
"There pine neglected, and return no more: --
"Ah rest in peace, each injured, parted shade,
"By cruel hands in death's dark weeds arrayed.
"The days to come shall to your memory raise
"Piles on these shores, to spread thro' earth your praise."

From Brooklyn heights a Hessian doctor came,
Not great his skill, nor greater much his fame;
Fair Science never called the wretch her son,
And Art disdained the stupid man to own; --
Can you admire that Science was so coy,
Or Art refused his genius to employ? --
Do men with brutes an equal dullness share,
Or cuts yon' grovelling mole the midway air --
In polar worlds can Eden's blossoms blow,
Do trees of God in barren deserts grow.
Are loaded vines to Etna's summit known,
Or swells the peach beneath the frozen zone --
Yet still he put his genius to the rack
And, as you may suppose, was owned a quack.

He on his charge the healing work begun
With antimonial mixtures, by the tun,
Ten minutes was the time he deigned to stay,
The time of grace allotted once a day. --
He drenched us well with bitter draughts, 'tis true,
Nostrums from hell, and cortex from Peru --
Some with his pills he sent to Pluto's reign,
And some he blistered with his flies of Spain;
His Tartar doses walked their deadly round,
Till the lean patient at the potion frowned
And swore that hemlock, death, or what you will,
Were nonsense to the drugs that stuffed his bill. --
On those refusing, he bestowed a kick,
Or menaced vengeance with his walking stick; --
Here, uncontrouled, he exercised his trade,
And grew experienced by the deaths he made.
By frequent blows we from his cane endured
He killed at least as many as he cured,
On our lost comrades built his future fame,
And scattered fate where'er his footsteps came.

Some did not bend, submissive to his skill,
And swore he mingled poison with his pill,
But I acquit him by a fair confession,
He was no Myrmidon -- he was a Hessian --
Although a dunce, he had some sense of sin
Or else the lord knows where we now had been;
No doubt, in that far country sent to range
Where never prisoner meets with an exchange --
No centries stand, to guard the midnight posts,
Nor seal down hatch-ways on a crowd of ghosts.

Knave though he was, yet candour must confess
Not chief Physician was this man of Hesse --
One master o'er the murdering tribe was placed,
By him the rest were honoured or difgraced;
Once, and but once, by some strange fortune led
He came to see the dying and the dead --
He came -- but anger so deformed his eye,
And such a faulchion glittered on his thigh,
And such a gloom his visage darkened o'er,
And two such pistols in his hands he bore!
That, by the gods! -- with such a load of steel,
He came, we thought, to murder, not to heal --
Rage in his heart and mischief in his head,
He gloomed destruction, and had smote us dead,
Had he so dared -- but fear with-held his hand --
He came -- blasphemed and turned again to land.

From this poor vessel, and her sickly crew
A British seaman all his titles drew,
Captain, esquire, commander, too, in chief,
And hence he gained his bread, and hence his beef,
But, sir, you might have searched creation round
And such another ruffian not have found --
Though unprovoked, an angry face he bore,
All were astonished at the oaths he swore;
He swore, till every prisoner stood aghast,
And thought him Satan in a brimstone blast;
He wished us banished from the public light,
He wished us shrouded in perpetual night!
That were he king, no mercy would he show,
But drive all rebels to the world below;
That if we scoundrels did not scrub the decks
His staff should break our base rebellious necks; --
He swore, besides, that should the ship take fire
We too must in the pitchy flames expire;
And meant it so -- this tyrant, I engage,
Had lost his life, to gratify his rage. --

If where he walked a murdered carcase lay,
Still dreadful was the language of the day --
He called us dogs, and would have held us so,
But terror checked the meditated blow,
Of vengeance, from our injured nation due
To him, and all the base unmanly crew.

Such food they sent, to make complete our woes,
It looked like carrion torn from hungry crows:
Such vermin vile on every joint were seen,
So black, corrupted, mortified, and lean,
That once we tryed to move our flinty chief,
And thus addressed him, holding up the beef:

"See, captain, see! what rotten bones we pick,
"What kills the healthy cannot cure the sick:
"Not dogs on such by Christian men are fed,
"And see, good master, see, what lousy bread!"
"Your meat or bread" (this man of death replied)
"'Tis not my care to manage or provide --
"But this, base rebel dogs, Ied have you know,
"That better than you merit we bestow:
"Out of my sight!" -- nor more he deigned to say
But whisked about, and frowning, strode away.

Each day, at least six carcases we bore
And scratched them graves along the sandy shore.
By feeble hands the shallow graves were made,
No stone, memorial, o'er the corpses laid;
In barren sands, and far from home, they lie,
No friend to shed a tear, when passing by;
O'er the mean tombs the insulting Britons tread,
Spurn at the sand, and curse the rebel dead.

When to your arms these fatal islands fall,
(For first, or last, they must be conquered all)
Americans! to rites sepulchral just,
With gentlest footstep press this kindred dust,
And o'er the tombs, if tombs can then be found,
Place the green turf, and plant the myrtle round.

These all in Freedom's sacred cause allied,
For Freedom ventured and for Freedom died.
To base subjection they were never broke,
They could not bend beneath a foreign yoke:
Had these survived, perhaps in thraldom held,
To serve the Britons they had been compelled --
Ungenerous deed! -- can they the charge deny?
This to avoid how many chose to die.

Americans! a just resentment shew,
And glut revenge on this detested foe;
While the warm blood distends the glowing vein
Still shall resentment in your bosoms reign:
Can you forget the greedy Briton's ire,
Your fields in ruin, and your domes on fire,
No age, no sex, from lust and murder free,
And, black as night, the hell-born refugee!
Must York forever your best blood entomb,
And these gorged monsters triumph in our doom,
Who leave no art of cruelty untryed; --
Such heavy vengeance, and such hellish pride!
Death has no charms -- his realms dejected lie
In the dull climate of a clouded sky,
Death has no charms, except in British eyes,
See, armed for blood, the ambitious vultures rise,
See how they pant to stain the world with gore,
And millions murdered, still would murder more;
That selfish race, from all the world disjoined,
Perpetual discord spread among mankind,
Aim to extend their empire o'er the ball,
Subject, destroy, absorb, and conquer all;
As if the power, that formed us, did condemn
All other nations to be slaves to them --
Rouse from your sleep, and crush the invading band,
Defeat, destroy, and sweep them from the land,
Allyed like you, what madness to despair, --
Attack the ruffians while they linger there;
There Tryon sits, a tyrant all complete,
See Vaughan, there, with rude Knyphausen meet,
And every wretch, whom honour should detest
There finds a home -- and Arnold with the rest.

Ah! traitors, lost to every sense of shame,
Unjust supporters of a tyrant's claim;
Foes to the rights of freedom and of men,
Flushed with the blood of thousands you have slain,
To the just doom the righteous heavens decree
We leave you toiling still in cruelty,
Or on dark plans in future herds to meet,
Plans formed in hell, and projects half complete:
The years approach that shall to ruin bring
Your lords, your chiefs, your desolating king,
Whose murderous acts shall stamp his name accursed,
And his last efforts more than damn the first.






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