June 15, 1776

The “POET’s CORNER” in James Humphreys, Jr.’s Pennsylvania Ledger featured an ode to the war on June 15. The poet accompanied “Freedom cloth’d in robes of peace” on a journey from one battlefield to the next, beginning in Lexington, Massachusetts, and continuing on through the Plains of Abraham in Quebec. The ode describes horrific scenes of destruction and loss, but it ends on a hopeful note. Reason suggested that “sorrows soon will cease to flow,” and “Smiling Freedom will return, And horrid war no more.”

The Pennsylvania Ledger: Or the Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, & New-Jersey Weekly Advertiser
Printed by James Humphreys, Jr.

POET’s CORNER.
From the Lyon’s Mouth.
WAR an ODE.

ON all these dreary plains,
There yet a sorrowing Muse remains,
Who has seen with weeping eye,
These former domes of love and joy,
Happiness, contentment, case,
And Freedom cloth’d in robes of peace,
Where the Graces us’d to play,
Now fallen desolation’s prey;

With her I’ll view the scene of blood
And destruction, that pursued
The tracts of Mars, stern God of war,
When, riding in his brazen car;
Drawn by horses swift as wind,
With all the furies close behind,
And civil discord in his train
He took his way o’er heaps of slain.

First, shrouded in the veil of night,
To Lexington we’ll take our flight.
Borne on fancy’s rapid pinions,
Swift I fly through liquid regions,
Already do I see the ground
On which, her brows with cypress bound,
Britain’s genius mournful view’d
Her children shed each other’s blood.

Sudden darkness round is spread,
Hark! What roaring peals of thunder!
See the forked lightning fly!
The bodies of the mighty dead,
Their icy bands have burst assunder,
And, in silent majesty,
Rising from their tomb,
Stalk along the awful gloom.

Oh! from this more than deepest night
Quickly let us take our flight;
Swift as thought, convey’d through air,
I stand on Abr’am’s fatal plain,
Soft pity sheds a tender tear,
To think how many heroes, slain,
In the pride of youthful bloom,
On this spot have found a tomb.

Ah me! what hosts in dread array
Towards yonder City bend their way.
Hark! the angry cannons sound;
Nought but flame and smoak is seen,
Streams of blood bedew the ground,
Alas! how horrid is the scene.

Here the Son, his Parent’s pride,
The only comfort of their age,
On the field all crimson dy’d,
Feels the Tyrant’s keenest rage,
Here the bleeding Father lies,
His Widow’s and his Orphan’s cries
Assault his dying ear,
And fills his soul with deep despair.

Here the Patriot bends beneath
His wounds all honest on the breast,
He feels the approaching hand of death,
And with groaning sinks to rest,
That eye is clos’d in endless night
Which late flash’d terror round,
The arm so terrible in fight
Now helpless lies upon the ground.

Here the Lover seeking fame,
Meets a glorious death;
While his much lov’d Mistress’s name
Sounds upon his last breath.
Be calm, my tortur’d Soul, he cries,
Ye boisterous winds your raging cease,
Least my dreary, mournful sighs
Wound my fair Amanda’s peace.

But let some gentle breathing Zephyr,
In the softest, tenderest whisper,
Convey the tidings to her ear;
The drop, if she does drop a tear
Oh! let some little Cherub save,
And borne on pity’s downy wing,
The pearly treasure bring,
And cast it on my grave.

Most happy men! your troubles cease,
Your souls are fled to realms of peace;
Beyond a cruel Monarch’s power,
In some blest Elysian Bower,
Where bloody Tyrants ne’er can come;
Perhaps ye read your Country’s doom.
Oh! say, will never peace return?
Ah! are we ever doom’d to mourn?

Self whisp’ring reason tells me no,
Our sorrows soon will cease to flow;
Peace again will bless this shore,
Smiling Freedom will return,
And horrid war no more
Shall cause this land to mourn.
The Almighty’s self will interpose
This scene of blood to close.