The Liberty Minstrel | Page 4

its pleasures,
Afric's coast I left forlorn;

To increase a stranger's treasures,
O'er the raging billows borne.

Christian people bought and sold me,
Paid my price in paltry gold:

But though slave they have enrolled me
_Minds_ are never to be sold.
Is there, as ye sometimes tell me,
Is there one who reigns on high?

Has he bid you buy and sell me,
Speaking from his throne--the sky?

Ask him, if your knotted scourges,
Matches, blood-extorting
screws,
Are the means that duty urges
Agents of his will to use.
Hark! he answers--wild tornadoes,
Strewing yonder sea with wrecks,

Wasting towns, plantations, meadows,
Are the voice with which he
speaks.
He, foreseeing what vexations
Afric's sons should undergo,

Fixed their tyrant's habitations,
Where his whirlwinds answer--No!
By our blood in Afric' wasted,
Ere our necks received the chain;
By
the miseries that we tasted,
Crossing in your barks the main:
By our
sufferings, since ye brought us
To the man-degrading mart,
All
sustained by patience, taught us
Only by a broken heart--
Deem our nation brutes no longer,
Till some reason ye shall find,

Worthier of regard and stronger
Than the _color_ of our kind.

Slaves of gold! whose sordid dealings
Tarnish all your boasted
powers;
Prove that you have human feelings,
Ere you proudly
question ours.
NEGRO BOY SOLD FOR A WATCH.[1]
[Footnote 1: An African prince having arrived in England, and having
been asked what he had given for his watch, answered, "What I will

never give again--I gave a fine boy for it."]
Words by Cowper. Arranged by G.W.C. from an old theme.
[Music]
When avarice enslaves the mind,
And selfish views alone bear sway

Man turns a savage to his kind,
And blood and rapine mark his
way.
Alas! for this poor simple toy,
I sold the hapless Negro boy.
His father's hope, his mother's pride,
Though black, yet comely to the
view
I tore him helpless from their side,
And gave him to a ruffian
crew--
To fiends that Afric's coast annoy,
I sold the hapless Negro
Boy.
From country, friends, and parents torn,
His tender limbs in chains
confined,
I saw him o'er the billows borne,
And marked his agony
of mind;
But still to gain this simple toy,
I gave the weeping Negro
Boy.
In isles that deck the western wave
I doomed the hapless youth to
dwell,
A poor, forlorn, insulted slave!
A BEAST THAT
CHRISTIANS BUY AND SELL!
And in their cruel tasks employ

The much-enduring Negro Boy.
His wretched parents long shall mourn,
Shall long explore the distant
main
In hope to see the youth return;
But all their hopes and sighs
are vain:
They never shall the sight enjoy,
Of their lamented Negro
Boy.
Beneath a tyrant's harsh command,
He wears away his youthful prime;

Far distant from his native land,
A stranger in a foreign clime.
No
pleasing thoughts his mind employ,
A poor, dejected Negro Boy.
But He who walks upon the wind,
Whose voice in thunder's heard on
high,
Who doth the raging tempest bind,
And hurl the lightning

through the sky,
In his own time will sure destroy
The oppressor of
the Negro Boy.
I AM MONARCH OF NOUGHT I SURVEY.
A Parody. Air "Old Dr. Fleury."
I am monarch of nought I survey,
My wrongs there are none to
dispute;
My master conveys me away,
His whims or caprices to suit.

O slavery, where are the charms
That "patriarchs" have seen in thy
face;
I dwell in the midst of alarms,
And serve in a horrible place.
I am out of humanity's reach,
And must finish my life with a groan;

Never hear the sweet music of speech
That tells me my body's my
own.
Society, friendship, and love,
Divinely bestowed upon some,

Are blessings I never can prove,
If slavery's my portion to come.
Religion! what treasures untold,
Reside in that heavenly word!

More precious than silver or gold,
Or all that this earth can afford.

But I am excluded the light
That leads to this heavenly grace;
The
Bible is clos'd to my sight,
Its beauties I never can trace.
Ye winds, that have made me your sport,
Convey to this sorrowful
land,
Some cordial endearing report,
Of freedom from tyranny's
hand.
My friends, do they not often send,
A wish or a thought after
me?
O, tell me I yet have a friend,
A friend I am anxious to see.
How fleet is a glance of the mind!
Compared with the speed of its
flight;
The tempest itself lags behind,
And the swift-winged arrows
of light.
When I think of Victoria's domain,
In a moment I seem to
be there,
But the fear of being taken again,
Soon hurries me back to
despair.
The wood-fowl has gone to her nest,
The beast has lain down in his
lair;
To me, there's no season of rest,

Though I to my quarter repair.


If mercy, O Lord, is in store,
For those who in slavery pine;

Grant me when life's troubles are o'er,
A place in thy kingdom divine.
THE AFRIC'S DREAM.
Words by Miss Chandler. "Emigrant's Lament," arranged by G.W.C.
[Music]
Why did ye wake me from my sleep? It was a dream of bliss,
And ye
have torn me from that land, to pine again in this;
Methought,
beneath yon whispering tree, that I was laid to rest, The turf, with all its
with'ring flowers, upon my cold heart pressed.
My chains, these hateful chains, were gone--oh,