( HEPWORTH DIXON'S LIFE )

Manly teller of the tale!
Thou hast made me thrill and pale.
Almost tears have dimmed the page, —
I have felt in Penn's own age.

His the nature one appeal
From a worldly life could wheel, —
Quit the brink of rank and rule
To go live with ridicule;

For his soul decision had,
To part instant with the bad,
And from youth full stature find
For the conscience in his mind;

Not the wigged court to gain,
But be noble with the plain.
In his hat he talked to kings
On the plane of kingly things,

Till his father's giant pride
Humbled his strange son's beside,
Seeing that he did not quail
Rotting in the stinking jail.

Treading down the earth's contempt
Dreams high-hearted aye he dreamt,
Grasped across the ocean's health
More than Milton's Commonwealth;

And he touched it with his hand,
And he landed in his land, —
Brought the persecuted in;
Made them of his wish the kin.

Pennsylvania, wholesome grove!
Philadelphia, brother's love!
There the Continental men
Wrote the will of William Penn.