The Star Of The West.

I.

The cannon is mute and the sword in its sheath--
Uncrimsoned the banner floats joyous and fair:
Yet beauty is twining an evergreen wreath,
And the voice of the minstrel is heard on the air.
Are these for the glory encircling a crown--
A phantom evoked but by tyranny's breath?
Are these for the conqueror's vaunted renown--
All ghastly with gore, and all tainted with death?
Bright Star of the West--broad Land of the Free,
The wreath and the anthem are woven for thee!


II.

When Tyranny came, his fierce lions aloft
Told the instinct that burned in his cohorts of mail--
But our eagles swooped down, and the battle-field oft,
Was the grave of the foeman,--stern, ghastly and pale.
The cloud of the strife rolled darkly away--
And the carnage-fed wolves slunk back to their den--
While Peace shone around like the god of the day,
And shed her blest light on the children of men.
Bright Star of the West--broad Land of the Free!
The wreath and the anthem are woven for thee!