“And yet, if we in Boston To thwart the throne conspire, Our town may prove an altar, Our fortunes melt in fire. The sacrifice is ready; Yet first we wait reply,[11] To know we own a country To save, before we die.”[12] We met, and swore together, If fighting must be done, In Boston we would do it, We boys of Lebanon. We started out at midnight, And took the Indian suits, Our fathers’ trophies from the wars Where all had been recruits. We pack’d them up in knapsacks, And then with each a gun And tomahawk away we walk’d In pairs or one by one. By day we kept the forests; But when the sun was down, We hurried on to Boston, And scatter’d through the town. We hunted out our cousins. We told them why we came. “Aha,” said they, “we plot the same. We join you in the game.” They show’d us then, at morning, The “Tree of Liberty,” Where those who plann’d the Stamp Act[13] Had hung in effigy. A pole was now beside it; A flag it bore flew high;[14] The church bells all were ringing; A crowd had gather’d nigh. “To see this tree, the agent Of stamps,” we heard, “resign’d. Here too East India’s agent Should learn the people’s mind: The tea sent here to tax us Untouch’d away shall go; Or all will brand its consignee, Our own, our country’s foe.”[15] The people cheer’d the purpose; From lip to lip it pass’d; The crowd about went homeward; The sky was overcast. Each agent heard the message; No promise would he sign.[16] Again the town demanded one; Again did each decline.[17] Then Boston’s grand “Committee[18] Of Correspondence,” wrote To ask the farmers, “Would they stand By what the town would vote?” From every hill and valley Came back, as though one word, What Samuel Adams read with pride Where all the people heard: “Without a voice dissenting, We swear by you to stand. Our wealth or life preventing, The tea shall never land.”[18] Then dawn’d the stirring Sunday[19] When swift the news was pass’d, That one tea-ship they waited for, Was in the port at last. Not many went to church then; But all began to pray, With eyes to duty open wide— The Puritanic way. In haste we met together, Our work must be begun; We plann’d, then, how to do it, We boys of Lebanon. With Proctor[20] for our captain, We vow’d on hand to be, And cling like air and water there About the ship with tea.