The following poem, suggested by this debate, belongs to this history. TO C. S. I have seemed more prompt to censure wrong Than praise the right,--if seldom to thine ear My voice hath mingled with the exultant cheer Borne upon all our Northern winds along,-- If I have failed to join the fickle throng In wide-eyed wonder that thou standest strong In victory, surprised in thee to find Brougham's scathing power with Canning's grace combined,-- That he, for whom the ninefold Muses sang, From their twined arms a giant athlete sprang, Barbing the arrows of his native tongue With the spent shafts Latona's archer flung, To smite the Python of our land and time, Fell as the monster born of Crissa's slime, Like the blind bard who in Castalian springs Tempered the steel that clove the crest of kings, And on the shrine of England's freedom laid The gifts of Cumæ and of Delphi's shade,-- Small need hast thou of words of praise from me. Thou knowest my heart, dear friend, and well canst guess, That, even though silent, I have not the less Rejoiced to see thy actual life agree With the large future which I shaped for thee, When, years ago, beside the summer sea, White in the moon, we saw the long waves fall Baffled and broken from the rocky wall, That to the menace of the brawling flood Opposed alone its massive quietude, Calm as a fate, with not a leaf nor vine Nor birch-spray trembling in the still moonshine, Crowning it like God's peace. I sometimes think That night-scene by the sea prophetical, (For Nature speaks in symbols and in signs, And through her pictures human fate divines,)-- That rock, wherefrom we saw the billows sink In murmuring rout, uprising clear and tall In the white light of heaven, the type of one Who, momently by Error's host assailed, Stands strong as Truth, in greaves of granite mailed, And, tranquil-fronted, listening over all The tumult, hears the angels say, Well done! J. G. W. _11th month, 25th, 1854._ PEACEFUL OPPOSITION TO THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT. LETTER TO THE MAYOR OF BOSTON, FOR THE CELEBRATION JULY 4, 1854. SENATE CHAMBER, 1st July, 1854. Dear Sir,--I have been honored by the invitation of the municipal authorities of Boston to unite with them in commemorating the approaching anniversary of our National Independence. Please tender to them my gratitude, that they have thus remembered me, an absent citizen, who tries to serve truth and justice in the sphere where he has been placed. Pleasure would take me home among congenial souls, but duty keeps me here.