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attempts made by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them, by the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They, too, have been deaf to the voice of justice and consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace, friends.

16. We, therefore, the representatives of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, in general congress assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be FREE AND INDEPENDENT states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; and that, as FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which INDEPENDENT States may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of DIVINE PROVIDENCE, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.

XCI.-NOT ON THE BATTLE-FIELD.

JOHN PIERPONT.

1. O no, no-let me lie

Not on a field of battle, when I die!

Let not the iron tread

Of the mad war-horse crush my helmed head; Nor let the reeking knife,

That I have drawn against a brother's life,

Be in my hand when death

Thunders along, and tramples me beneath
His heavy squadron's heels,

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2. From such a dying bed,

Though o'er it float the stripes of white and red, And the bald eagle brings

The clustered stars upon his wide-spread wings, To sparkle in my sight,

O never let my spirit take her flight!

3. I know that Beauty's eye

Is all the brighter where gay pennants fly,

And brazen helmets dance,

And sunshine flashes on the lifted lance;

I know that bards have sung,

And people shouted till the welkin rung,

In honor of the brave

Who on the battle-field have found a grave;
I know that o'er their bones

Have grateful hands piled monumental stones.

4. Some of these piles I've seen : The one at Lexington, upon the green Where the first blood was shed

That to my country's independence led;
And others, on our shore,

The "Battle Monument" at Baltimore,
And that on Bunker's Hill.

Ay, and abroad, a few, more famous still;
Thy "Tomb," Themistocles,

That looks out yet upon the Grecian seas,
And which the waters kiss

That issue from the gulf of Salamis.

5. And thine, too, have I seen,

Thy mound of earth, Patroclus, robed in green, That, like a natural knoll,

Sheep climb and nibble over, as they stroll,

Watched by some turbaned boy,

Upon the margin of the plain of Troy.

6. Such honors grace the bed,

I know, whereon the warrior lays his head,
And hears, as life ebbs out,

The conquered flying, and the conqueror's shout.

But, as his eyes grow dim,

What is a column or a mound to him?

What to the parting soul,

The mellow note of bugles? What the roll

Of drums? No! Let me die

Where the blue heaven bends o'er me lovingly,

And the soft summer air,

As it goes by me, stirs my thin white hair,

And from my forehead dries

The death-damp as it gathers, and the skies

Seem waiting to receive

My soul to their clear depth! Or let me leave

The world when round my bed

Wife, children, weeping friends are gathered,

And the calm voice of prayer

And holy hymning shall my soul prepare
To go and be at rest

With kindred spirits-spirits who have blessed
The human brotherhood

By labors, cares, and counsels for their good.

7. And in my dying hour,

When riches, fame, and honor have no power
To bear the spirit up,

Or from my lips to turn aside the cup
That all must drink at last,

O, let me draw refreshment from the past!
Then let my soul run back,

With peace and joy along my earthly track,
And see that all the seeds

That I have scattered there, in virtuous deeds
Have sprung up, and have given,

Already, fruits of which to taste is heaven!

8. And though no grassy mound

Or granite pile say 'tis heroic ground

Where my remains repose,

Still will I hope-vain hope, perhaps !-that those

Whom I have striven to bless,

The wanderer reclaimed, the fatherless,

May stand around my grave,

With the poor prisoner, and the poorer slave,

And breathe a humbler prayer

That they may die like him whose bones are moldering there.

XCII.-MEXICO.

ATLANTIC MONTHLY.

1. Had the question been asked, forty years ago, what country, beside our own, possessed the greatest natural advantages, and gave the best promise of future growth and

prosperity, very likely the answer would have been Mexico, which had then just thrown off the Spanish yoke and achieved national independence. Cast aside for a moment all modern ideas derived from her known weakness and anarchy, and see how great and manifold those apparent advantages and prospects were.

2. Situated where the continent of North America is narrowing, from the immense breadth of the United States and British America, to that thread of communication between continents, the Isthmus of Panama, on the one side its shores are washed by the waters of the Gulf of Mexico for more than sixteen hundred miles, and on the other by the tranquil Pacific for four thousand more.

3. Yet the distance from her great eastern port, Vera Cruz, to the old Spanish treasure-depot, Acapulco, on the western coast, is not, as the bird flies, more than three hundred miles: a distance scarcely greater than from Boston to New York, and which, with modern means of transit, might be traversed between sunrise and sunset. Thus, with one hand she seemed ready to grasp the wealth of the Indies, while with the other she welcomed all the products of European skill. This wonderful geographic advantage had, indeed, been rendered futile in the past by the jealous spirit and the exclusive enactments of her oppressors. But what might not be hoped in the future from a free people quickened into fresh life by the breath of liberty?

4. Then the marvelous resources of every description which nature had crowded into her soil. Perhaps there is not on the whole earth another strip of country extending north and south only a thousand miles, and varying in width from one to five hundred miles, where, side by side are all climates and all their products. On the coast the land is low, hot, vaporous, and luxuriant,-the native home of the richest

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