OULD, HANNAH FLAGG, an American poet; born at Lancaster, Mass., in 1789; died at Newburyport, September 5, 1865. She was the daughter of a Revolutionary soldier, who removed with his family to Newburyport in 1800. Her first volume of poems was published in 1832, another in 1836, and another in 1841. She also published a collection of prose sketches, Gathered Leaves (1846); The Diosma, poems, original and selected (1850); The Youth's Coronal (1851); The Mother's Dream and Other Poems (1853); and Hymns and Poems for Children (1854). Her works are written in a simple and pleasing style.
THE PEBBLE AND THE ACORN.
"I am a Pebble! and yield to none!"
Were the swelling words of a tiny stone;-
"Nor time nor seasons can alter me;
I am abiding while ages flee.
The pelting hail and the drizzling rain
Have tried to soften me, long in vain;
And the tender dew has sought to melt
Or touch my heart; but it was not felt.
There's none can tell about my birth,
For I'm as old as the big round earth.
The children of men arise and pass,
Out of the world like blades of grass;
And many a foot on me has trod,
That's gone from sight, and under the sod.
I am a Pebble! but who art thou,
Rattling along from the restless bough?"
The Acorn was shocked at this rude salute,
And lay for a moment abashed and mute;
She never before had been so near
This gravelly ball, the mundane sphere;
And she felt for a time at a loss to know
How to answer a thing so coarse and low.
But to give reproof of a nobler sort
Than the angry look, or the keen retort,
At length she said, in a gentle tone,
"Since it has happened that I am thrown
From the lighter element where I grew,
Down to another so hard and new,
And beside a personage so august,
Abased, I will cover my head with dust,
And quickly retire from the sight of one
Whom time, nor season, nor storm nor sun
Nor the gentle dew, nor the grinding heel,
Has ever subdued, or made to feel!"
And soon in the earth she sank away
From the comfortless spot where the Pebble lay.
But it was not long ere the soil was broke
By the peering head of an infant oak.
And as it arose, and its branches spread,
The Pebble looked up, and, wondering, said:
"A modest Acorn - never to tell
What was enclosed in its simple shell!
That the pride of the forest was folded up
In the narrow space of its simple cup!
And meekly to sink in the darksome earth:
Which proves that nothing could hide her worth!
And, oh! how many will tread on me,
To come and admire the beautiful tree,
Whose head is towering toward the sky.
Above such a worthless thing as I!
Useless and vain, a cumberer here,
I have been idling from year to year.
But never from this shall a vaunting word
From the humbled Pebble again be heard,
Till something without me or within
Shall show the purpose for which I've been!”—
The Pebble its vow could not forget,
And it lies there wrapt in silence yet.
The Frost looked forth, one still, clear night,
And he said, "Now I shall be out of sight;
So through the valley and over the height
In silence I'll take my way.
I will not go like that blustering train,
The wind and the snow, the hail and the rain,
Who make so much bustle and noise in vain,
But I'll be busy as they!"
Then he flew to the mountain, and powdered its crest; He climbed up the trees, and their boughs he dressed With diamonds and pearls; and over the breast
Of the quivering lake he spread
A coat of mail, that it need not fear
The downward point of many a spear
That he hung on its margin far and near
Where a rock could rear its head.
He went to the windows of those who slept,
And over each pane like a fairy crept,
Wherever he breathed, wherever he stepped
By the light of the moon were seen
Most beautiful things. There were flowers and trees,
There were bevies of birds and swarms of bees,
There were cities, thrones, temples and towers, and these
All pictured in silver sheen!
But he did one thing that was hardly fair,
He peeped in the cupboard, and finding there
That all had forgotten for him to prepare
"Now, just to set them a-thinking,
I'll bite this basket of fruit," said he,
"This costly pitcher I'll burst in three,
And the glass of water they've left for me
Shall 'tchick!' to tell them I'm drinking."
It snows! it snows! from out the sky
The feathered flakes, how fast they fly,
Like little birds, that don't know why
They're on the chase, from place to place,
While neither can the other trace.
It snows! it snows! a merry play
Is o'er us on this heavy day!
As dancers in an airy hall,
That hasn't room to hold them all,
While some keep up, and others fall,
The atoms shift, then, thick and swift,
They drive along to form the drift,
That weaving up, so dazzling white,
Is rising like a wall of light.
But now the wind comes whistling loud,
To snatch and waft it as a cloud,
Or giant phantom in a shroud;
It spreads! it curls! it mounts and whirls,
At length a mighty wing unfurls;
And then, away! but where none knows,
Or ever will. It snows! it snows!
To-morrow will the storm be done;
Then, out will come the golden sun;
And we shall see, upon the run
Before his beams, in sparkling streams,
What now a curtain o'er him seems.
And thus, with life, it ever goes;
'Tis shade and shine! - it snows! it snows!
THE VETERAN AND THE CHILD.
Come, grandfather, show how you carried your gun, To the field, where American freedom was won,
Or bore your old sword, which you say was new then,
When you rose to command, and led forward your men; And tell how you felt with the balls whizzing by, When the wounded fell round you, to bleed and to die!"
The prattler had stirred in the veteran's breast
The embers of fires that had long been at rest.
The blood of his youth rushed anew through his veins;
The soldier returned to his weary campaigns;
His perilous battles at once fighting o'er,
While the soul of nineteen lit the eye of fourscore.
"I carried my musket, as one that must be
But loosed from the hold of the dead or the free!
And fearless I lifted my good, trusty sword,
In the hand of a mortal, the strength of the Lord!
In battle, my vital flame freely I felt
Should go, but the chains of my country to melt!
"I sprinkled my blood upon Lexington's sod,
And Charlestown's green height to the war-drum I trod. From the fort on the Hudson, our guns I depressed,
The proud coming sail of the foe to arrest.
I stood at Stillwater, the Lakes, and White Plains
And offered for freedom to empty my veins !
"Dost now ask me, child, since thou hear'st where I've been,
Why my brow is so furrowed, my locks white and thin Why this faded eye cannot go by the line,
Trace out little beauties, and sparkle like thine;
Or why so unstable this tremulous knee,
Who bore 'sixty years since,' such perils for thee?
"What! sobbing so quick? are the tears going to start? Come! lean thy young head on thy grandfather's heart. It has not much longer to glow with the joy
I feel thus to clasp thee, so noble a boy!
But when in earth's bosom it long has been cold,
A man, thou'lt recall what, a babe, thou art told."
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