Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807–1892). The Poetical Works in Four Volumes. 1892.

Songs of Labor and Reform

To Pius IX.

The writer of these lines is no enemy of Catholics. He has, on more than one occasion, exposed himself to the censures of his Protestant brethren, by his strenuous endeavors to procure indemnification for the owners of the convent destroyed near Boston. He defended the cause of the Irish patriots long before it had become popular in this country; and he was one of the first to urge the most liberal aid to the suffering and starving population of the Catholic island. The severity of his language finds its ample apology in the reluctant confession of one of the most eminent Romish priests, the eloquent and devoted Father Ventura.

THE CANNON’S brazen lips are cold;

No red shell blazes down the air;

And street and tower, and temple old,

Are silent as despair.

The Lombard stands no more at bay,

Rome’s fresh young life has bled in vain;

The ravens scattered by the day

Come back with night again.

Now, while the fratricides of France

Are treading on the neck of Rome,

Hider at Gaeta, seize thy chance!

Coward and cruel, come!

Creep now from Naples’ bloody skirt;

Thy mummer’s part was acted well,

While Rome, with steel and fire begirt,

Before thy crusade fell!

Her death-groans answered to thy prayer;

Thy chant, the drum and bugle-call;

Thy lights, the burning villa’s glare;

Thy beads, the shell and ball!

Let Austria clear thy way, with hands

Foul from Ancona’s cruel sack,

And Naples, with his dastard bands

Of murderers, lead thee back!

Rome’s lips are dumb; the orphan’s wail,

The mother’s shriek, thou mayst not hear

Above the faithless Frenchman’s hail,

The unsexed shaveling’s cheer!

Go, bind on Rome her cast-off weight,

The double curse of crook and crown,

Though woman’s scorn and manhood’s hate

From wall and roof flash down!

Nor heed those blood-stains on the wall,

Not Tiber’s flood can wash away,

Where, in thy stately Quirinal,

Thy mangled victims lay!

Let the world murmur; let its cry

Of horror and disgust be heard;

Truth stands alone; thy coward lie

Is backed by lance and sword!

The cannon of St. Angelo,

And chanting priest and clanging bell,

And beat of drum and bugle blow,

Shall greet thy coming well!

Let lips of iron and tongues of slaves

Fit welcome give thee; for her part,

Rome, frowning o’er her new-made graves,

Shall curse thee from her heart!

No wreaths of sad Campagna’s flowers

Shall childhood in thy pathway fling;

No garlands from their ravaged bowers

Shall Terni’s maidens bring;

But, hateful as that tyrant old,

The mocking witness of his crime,

In thee shall loathing eyes behold

The Nero of our time!

Stand where Rome’s blood was freest shed,

Mock Heaven with impious thanks, and call

Its curses on the patriot dead,

Its blessings on the Gaul!

Or sit upon thy throne of lies,

A poor, mean idol, blood-besmeared,

Whom even its worshippers despise,

Unhonored, unrevered!

Yet, Scandal of the World! from thee

One needful truth mankind shall learn:

That kings and priests to Liberty

And God are false in turn.

Earth wearies of them; and the long

Meek sufferance of the Heavens doth fail;

Woe for weak tyrants, when the strong

Wake, struggle, and prevail!

Not vainly Roman hearts have bled

To feed the Crosier and the Crown,

If, roused thereby, the world shall tread

The twin-born vampires down!

1849.