Thus Liberty dawned from the midnight of years; And here rose her altar. Oh kneel at her shrine! Her blessings unnumbered--ye children of tears, Whatever be thy Fatherland--lo they are thine! In faith and in joy, let us cherish the light, That comes like the sunshine all warm from above, For thus shall the Demons that sprung from the night Of the Past fade away in the noontide of love. Bright Star of the West--broad Land of the Free, The wreath and the anthem are woven for thee! IV. Stern Seer of the future, thy curtain unroll, And show to long ages our empire of peace-- Where man never bent to the despot's control, And the spirit of liberty never shall cease. Our Stars and our Stripes 'mid battle's loud thunder, Were bound by our sires in the wedlock of love-- Oh! ne'er shall the spirit of strife put asunder, The UNION thus hallowed by spirits above. Bright Star of the West--broad Land of the Free, The wreath and the anthem are woven for thee! The Outcast. [Illustration: The Outcast] I. Far, far away, where sunsets weave Their golden tissues o'er the scene, And distant glaciers, dimly heave, Like trailing ghosts, their peaks between-- Where, at the Rocky Mountain's base, Arkansas, yet an infant, lingers, A while the drifting leaves to chase, Like laughing youth, with playful fingers-- There Nature, in her childhood, wrought 'Mid rock and rill, with leaf and flower, A vale more beautiful than thought E'er gave to favored fairy's bower: And in that hidden hermitage, Of forest, river, lake, and dell,-- While Time himself grew gray and sage, The lone Enchantress loved to dwell. II.