Written for the Carriers of the Boston Gazette, January 1, 1802.
AGAIN the Sun his fiery steeds has driven,
To melt with day the clouds of nether heaven.
T' Antarctic skies he shoots his torrid beams,
And bids the Naiads bathe in polar streams;
On diamond hills of ice, unsunned before,
He points his focus, and new oceans roar;
The vast suffusion gushes down the sides
Of mother earth, and gives St. Pierre his tides;
While floating Glaciers gem the torrent's way,
Exult in light, and, as they shine, decay.
Nations, from under ground, pop out their heads,
To hail the spiral morning as it spreads;
And gaze with wonder, (poor benighted souls!)
On that bright orb, which Candles gives and Coals.
Each Nymph, with furs thrown off, her face discloses,
To breathe an air that does not bite off noses;
And leaves a six-month's fire, to gather roses!
While nature, all alive, with Spring bedight,
Peals her hosannas to the Power of Light.
But while the joys of polar realms and tribes, The newsboy with red-lettered rhyme describes, 'Tis fit, though bards and beggars love to roam, To shoot a distich at great folks at home.
And here, alas, with aching heart and sad,
His Pegasus must needs become a Pad;
For sure the Muse should shuffle in her gait,
When nought but thorough pacing suits the State.
Who to the clime his pliant habit forms,
Has boots for mire, and roquelaures for storms;
But the news-pedlar, bold as man of rhymes,
Will face the whirlwind, and will cuff the times!
Unlike the scene, which erewhile cheered the soul, But which we left behind us at the pole,
Is this drear season, which, of life bereft,
Gives up to Bankruptcy, what Anarch left.
Cold to the patriot's heart, and newsboy's knuckles,
Misfortune on our backs it doubly buckles;
In trade's great toe it sticks a festering splinter,
And gives us peace, democracy and winter;
Threatens a frost, to freeze our current cash,
To snap our crockery, our credit smash;
With banded hordes it fills our publick roads,
Our smoaking streets with prostate mansions loads;
Frost-nips the banks, internal taxes clips,
Makes carpenters of worms, to bore our ships;
From emigration takes off all its shackles,
And a Swiss Dray-horse in state-harness tackles;
Capacity it gives to every rogue,
And finds certificate of birth in-brogue;
Distinction levels, all allegiance blends,
And whisky cits, from bogs, to congress sends;
All strangers naturalizes-all embraces,
With no exception, but the hue of faces;
Felons from Newgate 'scaped, and vermined straw, To rail at feather-beds, and common law;
Fools with long ears, who bray, when Patriots bawl,
Or knaves transported-with no ears at all.
But while to vagrant tribes our laws are kind,
The sable sans-culottes no mercy find;
Alas! how moral, how humane, the times,
When Philosophs compile a code of crimes!
A deadly sin the Negro's breast imbues,
He loves the female, more than Mammoth does;
And viler still to him, whose pointer nose
Smells not a poppy, as it smells a rose ;
The Negro, formed a slave from Nature's hands, "Sweats more at pores, and less secretes at glands."
Sad and reversed, as this drear scene appears,
There are, who batten on a Patriot's tears;
But still on them the same privations fall,
The Sun's a common good, and cheers us all ;
And when on other realms, and distant skies,
He showers that radiance, he to us denies,
The " eager and the biting air" we feel,
May chill the limbs, but nerves the heart with steel,
For poor in soul is he, who calm can view
That plastic orb, which erst, to order true,
Th' Ecliptic path in equal course did run,
And shone the civil, like the natural sun,
Now o'er our dark horizon's ridge incline
A watery lustre, and a sloping line;
Beyond th' Equator keep his rolling throne,
And in the southern solstice shine alone!
The following lines appeared in the Centinel, February, 1793. They were sent to a beautiful young lady, on hearing her express a wish to ascend in Blanchard's Balloon.
FORBEAR, Sweet girl; your scheme forego,
And thus our anxious troubles end:
you will mount, full well we know, But greatly fear you'll not descend.
When Angels see a mortal rise,
So beautiful, divine and fair,
They'll not dismiss you from the skies,
But keep their sister Angel there.
To the above, Mr. Paine soon after wrote the following reply.
TRUE, gentle bard, should lovely Grace
On aeronautick pinions rise,
Angels would own their " Sister's" face,
Thrice welcome to her native skies.
But conscious should the nymph remain,
Earth's loud laments would rend their ears:
They'd send the Heroine down again,
To sooth and bless a world in tears.
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