America: The Polynesian, July 4, 1844

America 
(For the Polynesian)

Published July 27, 1844 Honolulu

By “Z,” July 4, 1844

A world is found-hid in the distant west,

It lay for ages in old ocean’s breast;

There it had been since first the East began,

And still unknown, untrod by haughty man;

There it had mocked in solitude sublime,

Improvement’s strides-the lofty march of time.

Long had proud Europe slept in starless night,

Old Greece and Rome were gone, and with them light;

Fair wisdom wept in solitary glen,

With monks retired from the paths of men;

And science buried in those awful cells,

No sweeter praise she heard than chime of bells.

And there, recluse, full oft she mourned the hour,

When conquering ignorance bound her magic power.

But age on age at length had rolled away,

Knowledge resumed her proud and ancient sway,

And now fair wisdom, that celestial maid,

Had fled from monks and burst the cloistered shade,

When bold Columbus left his native land,

To seek another world-another strand.

He leaves his kindred and his native shore,

Treads in a path that none had trod before;

And fearless tempts the perils of the deep,

The winds, the waves, the storms, that never sleep.

Hope swells his sail-ambition steers his bark-

Fame is the prize-a distant world the mark.

The dangers past, the lengthened voyage o’er,

Triumphant now he treads Columbia’s shore.

And now the thought exulting heaves his breast,

That he from peril here has found a rest;

That he has turned the shafts of scorn aloof,

With truth’s strong buckler-all-protecting proof;

That he has given with unsparing hands,

To princes empires, and to peasants lands.

Nor was forgot in that exulting hour,

The leading hand of an Almighty Power;

For, bending low he worshipped on the sod,

And breathed with pious lips a thank to God.

Now we see wide-spreading to the astonished view,

A world around us how sublimely new.

See lofty hills in slow graduation rise,

Until at length they seem to pierce the skies;

See many a stream flow on through many a plain,

Still gathering strength until they reach the main;

O’er many a break see mountain streamlets bound,

And lofty forests nodding all around.

Here oft is heard the long and mad’ning howl,

Of savage men and savage beasts that prowl;

Here stalks the Indian in the midnight deep,

Dreams of revenge or waking or sleep;

Here oft these wilds have known the bloody scene,

When life runs out in many a crimson stream;

And oft they’d known the fierce and awful hour,

When weakness faintly gasped in savage power.

Land of the mountain and the mighty flood,

O Nature made thee in her wildest mood!

Land of the forest and the mighty lake,

Man calls on thee-from solitude awake!

The world goes on-see change succeed to change,

How trifling some, and some how passing strange;

See now Columbia smile from shore to shore,

A desert waste three hundred years before;

Where forests stood see mighty cities rise,

Whose lofty domes aspiring reach the skies;

See farm and village spread o’er many a plain,

Where solitude once held her ancient reign;

See science shine, see flourish every art,

And trade and commerce thrive in every part;

Her sons ne’er bow to proud oppression’s nod,

They fear but one-they worship only God.

Favored of Heaven!-Land of the brave and free!-

The oppressed from every country fly to thee;

If once they reach thy hospitable shore,

Of dangers past and toils, they dream no more;

But there in peace they tie the social knot,

The present unperplexed-the past forgot.

With thee Columbia my native land,

May gracious Heaven deal with gentle hand;

May it avert from thee the storms of State,

And every woe that latent may await;

May some kind Angel guard thy boundless shore,

Alike from foreign and intestine war;

May the hot blood of fierce and lawless broil,

Ne’er impious stain thy consecrated soil,-

But if my country’s violated laws,

Or if fair freedom’s ever sacred cause,

Demands imperious the avenging sword;

Of then may victory be the just award,-

Then, then in triumph may thy banner wave,

And its bright star to glory guide the brave.

Honolulu, July 4, 1844                        Z.