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And I'm longing, longing, longing for the day of my home

coming,

For the lowing of the cattle and the shadows on the stream, For the mocking-bird's far calling, and the laden bees' soft humming,

And the night-dews falling coolly as the shadows in a dream.

Oh, the rolling, rolling prairies, and the grasses waving, waving Like green billows neath the gulf breeze in the perfumed,

purple gloam!

Oh, my heart is heavy, heavy, and my eyes are craving, craving, For the fertile plains and forests of my far-off Texas home.

POCAHONTAS

By J. T. LITTLETON

['The Story of Captain Smith and Pocahontas,' 1907. Copyright, Publishing House of the M.E. Church, South. By permission.]

Sweet Pocahontas, Indian maiden born,

With thine we rank thy noble brother's name,

Full worthy each of an immortal fame;

For when our nation in its lurid morn,
A weakling in the wilderness forlorn,

Was feebly struggling, swift to help ye came
Impelled by innate virtues, put to shame
The haughty Christians who thy people scorn.
Thy life, sweet Indian maid, is fitting theme
For poet's pen or sage's puissant brain;

Its beauty lures us, and we fain would know
Its source. Thought-baffled, as before a dream,
We ope our hearts as earth to summer rain,

Nor seek to know, but gladly drink and grow.

VICTORY,

By J. T. LITTLETON

['The Story of Captain Smith and Pocahontas,' 1907. Copyright, Publishing House of the M.E. Church, South. By permission.]

Calmly gazing at his captors

Dressed in bear skins and raccoon,
On their features doubly frightful,
Painted with the red puccoon,

More like creatures of the forest,
With the beast above the mind
(Still the feelings in their faces
Linked them surely with his kind);

Seeing in them superstition

Throttling with uncanny hand
Every impulse of their bosoms
Till it be as weak as sand—

Quickly, as by intuition,

Reckoning thus with reason clear,
Captain Smith, Virginia's father,
Casting off all marks of fear,

Drew from underneath his doublet
Slowly forth his compass-case,
Which he opened, deftly showing
How beneath its crystal face

Ever northward points the needle.

Childrenlike, they fain would clutch,
Feel the force that moved the magnet
Which they saw but could not touch.

Wondrous strange! It was a spirit!
Was it gracious? Was it wroth?
Though afraid, they hovered 'round it
As the fire the evening moth.

Gone their wrath for very wonder;
They forebore to strike him down.
In an open council standing,

They preferred to lead him round

To their wigwams for their sachems,
Squaws, papooses—all to see,
As some wizard son of evil

From beyond the mighty sea.

So they led him with great triumph
To their tepees here and there,
While their fears were softly fleeting
As doth happen when the air,

Moisture-laden, filled with specters,
Haunting forest pool and fen,
In the wonder of the starlight
Bringing fear to forest men,

Slowly while the morning dawneth
Passes from the pool and fen,

Bearing strangely and so weirdly

Dream and doubt from hearts of men.

Then the tide began its turning,

First with eddies, ebb and flow, Rippling here and resting yonder, Hardly knowing how to go.

Blood of kindred crying vengeance,
Savage justice crying death,
And the savage love of prowess
Softly and with bated breath.

Whispering to adopt the white man,
Paint him red and spare his life,

Struggled daily with each other
In a crafty, subtle strife.

Though the odds were sore against him
And the stakes his very heart
Yet the doughty English captain
Calmly played his fearful part-

Calmly, for the red papooses,

For the girls and for the boys,
From the fragrant wood of cedar,
With his penknife fashioned toys.

Winning thus the hearts of children,
Softening thus the mothers' hate;
Trusting God, he simply waited
The unfolding of his fate.

THE OLD NORTH STATE

A TOAST

By MRS. LEONORA MONTEIRO MARTIN

[Written for a banquet of the North Carolina Society of Richmond, Virginia, May 20, 1904.]

Here's to the land of the Long Leaf Pine,

The Summer Land, where the sun doth shine;

Where the weak grow strong, and the strong grow great— Here's to "Down Home," the Old North State!

Here's to the land of the cotton blooms white,
Where the scuppernong perfumes the breeze at night,
Where the soft Southern moss and jessamine mate,
'Neath the murmuring pines of the Old North State!

Here's to the land where the galax grows,
Where the rhododendron roseate glows;
Where soars Mount Mitchell's summit great,

In the "Land of the Sky," in the Old North State!

Here's to the land where maidens are fairest,
Where friends are the truest, and cold hearts are rarest;
The near land, the dear land, whatever our fate,
The blest land, the best land, the Old North State!

THE PASSING OF THE BRAVE

(GENERAL J. B. GORDON, JAN. 9, 1904.)

By IDA SLOCOMB MATTHEWS

[This poem was read at the meeting of the Louisiana Division of the U.D.C. at Thibodaux, April 13, 1904.]

Patriot, soldier, statesman,

Prince of the race of men,
Cypress and rue for his passing,
Laurel for sword and pen.

Dust for the hand that wrought,
But for the lessons taught
Life without end.

Gloom for the eye that brightened,
Looking where danger lay,
For the voice of the leader-silence,
And a shroud for the coat of gray.

But of the life's high aim
Echoing rings the fame,
Roll upon roll.

Gettysburg, Appomattox,

Yours were the hosts they knew,
The hand of the man was steady
The heart of the man was true.

Mark now the setting sun
Rests its last smile upon

The field where it rose.

Honored the steel he marshaled,
As honored the steel he tried;
Proud to be friend, ours followed,
Proud to be foe, theirs died.

Slowly the ranks pass on,
Softly the horizon

Clasps them and closes.

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