The Emigrants.

THE EMIGRANTS.

FROM THE GERMAN OF FREILIGRATH. BY CHARLES T. BROOKS.

I CANNOT take my eyes away
From you, ye busy, bustling band!
Your little all to see you lay
Each in the waiting seaman’s hand.

Ye men that from your necks let down
Your heavy baskets to the earth,
Of bread from German com baked brown
By German wives on German hearth.

And you, with braided tresses neat,
Black-Forest maidens, lithe and brown,
How careful, on the stoop’s green seat,
You set your pails and pitchers down.

Ah, oft have home’s cool shaded tanks
These pails and pitchers filled for you;
On far Missouri’s silent banks
Shall these the scenes of home renew:

The stone-rimmed fount in village-street,
Where oft ye stooped to chat and draw,
The hearth and each familiar seat,
The pictured tiles your childhood saw.

Soon, in the distant, wooded West,
Shall loghouse-walls therewith be graced;
Soon many a tired, tawny guest
Shall sweet refreshment from them taste.

From them shall drink the Cherokee,
Worn from the hot and dusty chase;
Nor more from German vintage ye
Shall bear them home in leaf-crowned grace.

Oh, say, why seek ye other lands?
The Neckar’s vale hath wine and corn;
Full of dark firs the Schwarzwald stands;
In Spessart rings the Alpherd’s horn.

Ah! in strange forests ye shall yearn
For the green mountains of your home!
To Deutschland’s yellow wheatfields turn,
In spirit o’er her vinehills roam!

How will the forms of days grown pale
In golden dreams float softly by,
Like some wild legendary tale
Before fond memory’s moistened eye.

The boatman calls;—Go hence in peace!
God bless you, man and wife and sire!
Bless all your fields with rich increase,
And crown each faithful heart’s desire!