Mary Anne Rawson's The Bow in the Cloud (1834): A Scholarly EditionMain MenuEditor's IntroductionEditor's IntroductionThe Published AnthologyContains all of the pieces published in the anthology, with an editor's noteSelected Unpublished PiecesTranscriptions of some unpublished pieces sent to RawsonText analysisResults of analysing the anthology and its manuscriptsNetwork AnalysisNetwork analysis prototypes, including a network graph of connections in the archiveMap of PlacenamesA map of all places associated with pieces in the anthologyPeople MentionedBow in the Cloud: PersonographyFurther ReadingsA Bibliography of sources relating to this projectThis project was supported by an NEH-Mellon Fellowship for Digital Publication in 2023/2024 (FEL-289788). Find project data on GitHub.
12023-10-11T12:18:22+00:00Slavery, by A. H. Smith7Poem by A. H. S.plain2023-10-11T12:47:48+00:00 O ye who hate oppression, On the land or on the wave, Think, O think of St. Domingo, When they tell you that the Slave Can never bear his freedom, and that the galling chain, In phrensy snapt asunder, will reunite again.
Go read its glorious history In the infamy of Gaul, In Napoleon's humbled legions, And the overthrow of all The tyrant's base endeavours to quench, ere it was yet Fanned to its true sublimity, the wild-fire he had lit.
And now that half a century Of liberty hath smiled O'er a country once degraded, A paradise run wild, And only rendered fruitful by the scarring whip and chain -- Hath want e'er traced on freedom's brow, "my manacles again?"
Then away, away for ever, With the impious thought that dare, In the face of God and nature, And their witness every where, The universal sun, and heaven's blue arch sublime Bending o'er all, deny man's right in every clime.
Then, noble-minded Britons, Shall Afric's sons be slaves? Shall your tarnished banner float O'er the blood-complaining waves? Shall the orphan's cry for ever, and the widow's frantic wail, From that living charnel-house arise, like poison on the gale?
When ye, whose voice hath oft Made tyranny to feel, That ye were not the victims To grace his chariot wheel, Can waft your mandate o'er the main, and grant to every isle That boon which else shall yet be snatched from slavery's funeral pile.
And will ye tamely give Twenty millions of your gold? Or acknowledge, e'en, a mart Where man is bought and sold? And unto him who promised bread, but gave a scorpion, bow? And slaves, will ye? No; look to God, and to your right arms now.
No; look to God alone, The Christian meek responds, Though still the seal of blood Be on your altered bonds, Assured that He, who often turns the labyrinth of guilt Unto some deep mysterious good, when avarice has built --
A shrine, which bears alike, Both the symbol of the free, And the soul-debasing stain Of thrice-cursed slavery, Shall scan a fane, where, traced in light, creation's glorious plan Shall lead to all, of every hue, love to his fellow-man.