<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=350820" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>New-Englands Crisis</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">IN seventy five the Critick of our years<br>Commenc'd our war with Phillip and his peers.<br>Whither the sun in Leo had inspir'd<br>A feav'rish heat, and Pagan spirits fir'd?<br>Whither some Romish Agent hatcht the plot?<br>Or whither they themselves? appeareth not.<br>Whither our infant thrivings did invite?<br>Or whither to our lands pretended right?<br>Is hard to say; but Indian spirits need<br>No grounds but lust to make a Christian bleed.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>And here methinks I see this greazy Lout<br>With all his pagan slaves coil'd round about,<br>Assuming all the majesty his throne<br>Of rotten stump, or of the rugged stone<br>Could yield; casting some bacon-rine-like looks,<br>Enough to fright a Student from his books,<br>Thus treat his peers, and next to them his Commons,<br>Kennel'd together all without a summons.<br>&quot;My friends, our Fathers were not half so wise<br>As we our selves who see with younger eyes.<br>They sel our land to english man who teach<br>Our nation all so fast to pray and preach:<br>Of all our countrey they enjoy the best,<br>And quickly they intend to have the rest.<br>This no wunnegin, so big matchit law,<br>Which our old fathers fathers never saw.<br>These english make and we must keep them too,<br>Which is too hard for them or us to doe,<br>We drink we so big whipt, but english they<br>Go sneep, no more, or else a little pay.<br>Me meddle Squaw me hang'd, our fathers kept<br>What Squaws they would whither they wakt or slept.<br>Now if you'le fight Ile get you english coats,<br>And wine to drink out of their Captains throats.<br>The richest merchants houses shall be ours,<br>Wee'l ly no more on matts or dwell in bowers<br>Wee'l have their silken wives take they our Squaws,<br>They shall be whipt by virtue of our laws.<br>If ere we strike tis now before they swell<br>To greater swarmes then we know how to quell.<br>This my resolve, let neighbouring Sachems know,<br>And every one that hath club, gun or bow.&quot;<br>This was assented to, and for a close<br>He strokt his smutty beard and curst his foes.<br>This counsel lightning like their tribes invade,<br>And something like a muster's quickly made,<br>A ragged regiment, a naked swarm,<br>Whome hopes of booty doth with courage arm,<br>Set forthwith bloody hearts, the first they meet<br>Of men or beasts they butcher at their feet.<br>They round our skirts, they pare, they fleece they kil,<br>And to our bordering towns do what they will.<br>Poor Hovills (better far then Caesars court<br>In the experience of the meaner sort)<br>Receive from them their doom next execution,<br>By flames reduc'd to horror and confusion:<br>Here might be seen the smoking funeral piles<br>Of wildred towns pitcht distant many miles.<br>Here might be seen the infant from the breast<br>Snatcht by a pagan hand to lasting rest:<br>The mother Rachel-like shrieks out my child<br>She wrings her hands and raves as she were wild.<br>The bruitish wolves suppress her anxious moan<br>By crueltyes more deadly of her own.<br>Will she or nill the chastest turtle must<br>Tast of the pangs of their unbridled lust.<br>From farmes to farmes, from towns to towns they post,<br>They strip, they bind, they ravish, flea and roast.<br>The beasts which wont their masters crib to know,<br>Over the ashes of their shelters low.<br>What the inexorable flames doe spare<br>More cruel Heathen lug away for fare.<br>These tidings ebbing from the outward parts<br>Makes trades-men cast aside their wonted Arts<br>And study armes: the craving merchants plot<br>Not to augment but keep what they have got.<br>And every soul which hath but common sence<br>Thinks it the time to make a just defence.<br>Alarums every where resound in streets,<br>From West sad tidings with the Eastern meets.<br>Our common fathers in their Councels close<br>A martial treaty with the pagan foes,<br>All answers center here that fire and sword<br>Must make their Sachem universal Lord.<br>This armes the english with a resolution<br>To give the vaporing Scab a retribution.<br>Heav'ns they consult by prayer, the best design<br>A furious foe to quel or undermine.<br>RESOLV'D that from the Massachusets bands<br>Be prest on service some Herculean hands<br>And certainly he wel deserv'd a jerke<br>That slipt the Collar from so good a work.<br>Some Volunteers, some by compulsion goe<br>To range the hideous forrest for a foe.<br>The tender Mother now's all bowels grown,<br>Clings to her son as if they'd melt in one.<br>Wives claspe about their husbands as the vine<br>Huggs the fair elm, while tears burst out like wine.<br>The new-sprung love in many a virgin heart<br>Swels to a mountain when the lovers part.<br>Nephews and kindred turn all springs of tears,<br>Their hearts are so surpriz'd with panick fears.<br>But dolefull shrieks of captives summon forth<br>Our walking castles, men of noted worth,<br>Made all of life, each Captain was a Mars,<br>His name too strong to stand on waterish verse:<br>Due praise I leave to some poetick hand<br>Whose pen and witts are better at command.<br>Methinks I see the Trojan-horse burst ope,<br>And such rush forth as might with giants cope:<br>These first the natives treachery felt, too fierce<br>For any but eye-witness to rehearse.<br>Yet sundry times in places where they came<br>Upon the Indian skins they carv'd their name.<br>The trees stood Centinels and bullets flew<br>From every bush (a shelter for their crew)<br>Hence came our wounds and deaths from every side<br>While skulking enemies squat undiscri'd,<br>That every stump shot like a musketeer,<br>And bowes with arrows every tree did bear<br>The swamps were Courts of Guard, thither retir'd<br>The stragling blew-coats when their guns were fir'd,<br>In dark Meanders, and these winding groves,<br>Where Beares and panthers with their Monarch moves<br>These far more cruel slily hidden lay,<br>Expecting english men to move that way.<br>One party lets them slip, the other greets<br>Them with the next thing to their winding-sheets;<br>Most fall, the rest thus startled back return,<br>And from their by past foes receive an urn.<br>Here fel a Captain, to be nam'd with tears,<br>Who for his Courage left not many peers,<br>With many more who scarce a number left<br>To tell how treacherously they were bereft.<br>This flusht the pagan courage, now they think<br>The victory theirs, not lacking meat or drink.<br>The ranging wolves find here and there a prey,<br>And having fil'd their paunch they run away<br>By their Hosts light, the thanks which they return<br>Is to lead Captives and their taverns burn.<br>Many whose thrift had stor'd for after use<br>Sustain their wicked plunder and abuse.<br>Poor people spying an unwonted light,<br>Fearing a Martyrdom, in sudden fright<br>Leap to the door to fly, but all in vain,<br>They are surrounded with a pagan train;<br>Their first salute is death, which if they shun<br>Some are condemn'd the Gauntelet to run;<br>Death would a mercy prove to such as those<br>Who feel the rigour of such hellish foes.<br>Posts daily on their Pegasean Steeds<br>Bring sad reports of worse then Nero's deeds,<br>Such bruitish Murthers as would paper stain<br>Not to be heard in a Domitians Reign.<br>The field which nature hid is common laid,<br>And Mothers bodies ript for lack of aid.<br>The secret Cabinets which nature meant<br>To hide her master piece is open rent,<br>The half formd Infant there receives a death<br>Before it sees the light or draws its breath,<br>Many hot welcomes from the natives arms<br>Hid in their sculking holes many alarms<br>Our brethren had, and weary weary trants,<br>Sometimes in melting heats and pinching wants:<br>Sometimes the clouds with sympathizing tears<br>Ready to burst discharg'd about their ears:<br>Sometimes on craggy hills, anon in bogs<br>And miery swamps better befitting hogs,<br>And after tedious Marches little boast<br>Is to be heard of stewd or bakt or roast,<br>Their beds are hurdles, open house they keep<br>Through shady boughs the stars upon them peep,<br>Their chrystal drink drawn from the mothers breast<br>Disposes not to mirth but sleep and rest.<br>Thus many dayes and weeks, some months run out<br>To find and quell the vagabonding rout,<br>Who like inchanted Castles fair appear,<br>But all is vanisht if you come but near,<br>Just so we might the Pagan Archers track<br>With towns and merchandize upon their back;<br>And thousands in the South who settled down<br>To all the points and winds are quickly blown.<br>At many meetings of their fleeting crew,<br>From whom like haile arrows and bullets flew:<br>The English courage with whole swarms dispute,<br>Hundreds they hack in pieces in pursuit.<br>Sed haud impunè, English sides do feel<br>As well as tawny skins the lead and steel<br>And some such gallant Sparks by bullets fell,<br>As might have curst the powder back to Hell:<br>Had only Swords these skirmishes decided<br>All Pagan Sculls had been long since divided.<br>The lingring war out-lives the Summer sun,<br>Who hence departs hoping it might be done,<br>Ere his return at Spring but ah hee'l find<br>The Sword still drawn, men of unchanged mind.<br>Cold winter now nibbles at hands and toes<br>And shrewdly pinches both our friends and foes.<br>Fierce Boreas whips the Pagan tribe together<br>Advising them to fit for foes and weather:<br>The axe which late had tasted Christian bloud<br>Now sets its steely teeth to feast on wood.<br>The forests suffer now, by waight constrein'd<br>To kiss the earth with souldiers lately brain'd.<br>The lofty oakes and ash doe wagge the head<br>To see so many of their neighbours dead;<br>Their fallen carcasses are caried thence<br>To stand our enemies in their defence.<br>Their Myrmidons inclos'd with clefts of trees<br>Are busie like the ants or nimble bees:<br>And first they limber poles fix in the ground,<br>In figure of the heavens convex: all round<br>They draw their arras-matts and skins of beasts,<br>And under these the Elves do make their nests.<br>Rome took more time to grow then twice six hours,<br>But half that time will serve for indian bowers.<br>A Citty shall be rear'd in one dayes space<br>As shall an hundred english men out-face.<br>Canonicus precincts there swarmes unite,<br>Rather to keep a winter guard then fight.<br>A dern and dismal swamp some Scout had found<br>Whose bosome was a spot of rising ground<br>Hedg'd up with mighty oakes, maples and ashes,<br>Nurst up with springs, quick boggs and miery plashes,<br>A place which nature coyn'd on very nonce<br>For tygers not for men to be a sconce.<br>Twas here these Monsters shapt and fac'd like men<br>Took up there Rendezvouz and brumal den,<br>Deeming the depth of snow, hail, frost and ice<br>Would make our Infantry more tame and wise<br>Then by forsaking beds and loving wives,<br>Meerly for indian skins to hazzard lives:<br>These hopes had something calm'd the boiling passion<br>Of this incorrigible warlike nation.<br>During this short Parenthesis of peace<br>Our forces found, but left him not at ease.<br>Here english valour most illustrious shone,<br>Finding their numbers ten times ten to one.<br>A shower of leaden hail our captains feel<br>Which made the bravest blades among us reel.<br>Like to some ant-hill newly spurn'd abroad,<br>Where each takes heels and bears away his load:<br>Instead of plate and jewels, indian trayes<br>With baskets up they snatch and run their wayes.<br>Sundry the flames arrest and some the blade,<br>By bullets heaps on heaps of Indians laid.<br>The Flames like lightening in their narrow streets<br>Dart in the face of every one it meets.<br>Here might be heard an hideous indian cry,<br>Of wounded ones who in the Wigwams fry.<br>Had we been Canibals here might we feast<br>On brave Westphalia gammons ready drest.<br>The tauny hue is Ethiopick made<br>Of such on whome Vulcan his clutches laid.<br>There fate was sudden, our advantage great<br>To give them once for all a grand defeat;<br>But tedious travell had so crampt our toes<br>It was too hard a task to chase the foes.<br>Distinctness in the numbers of the slain,<br>Or the account of Pagans which remain<br>Are both uncertain, losses of our own<br>Are too too sadly felt, too sadly known.<br>War digs a common grave for friends and foes,<br>Captains in with the common souldier throws.<br>Six of our Leaders in the first assault<br>Crave readmission to their Mothers Vault<br>Who had they fell in antient Homers dayes<br>Had been enrol'd with Hecatombs of praise.<br>As clouds disperst, the natives troops divide,<br>And like the streames along the thickets glide.<br>Some breathing time we had, and short God knowes<br>But new alarums from recruited foes<br>Bounce at our eares, the mounting clouds of smoak<br>From martyr'd townes the heav'ns for aid invoke:<br>Churches, barns, houses with most ponderous things<br>Made volatile fly ore the land with wings.<br>Hundreds of cattle now they sacrifice<br>For aiery spirits up to gormandize;<br>And to the Molech of their hellish guts,<br>Which craves the flesh in gross, their ale in butts.<br>Lancaster, Medfield, Mendon wildred Groton,<br>With many Villages by me not thought on<br>Dy in their youth by fire that usefull foe,<br>Which this grand cheat the world will overflow.<br>The wandring Priest to every one he meets<br>Preaches his Churches funeral in the streets.<br>Sheep from their fold are frighted, Keepers too<br>Put to their trumps not knowing what to doe.<br>This monster Warre hath hatcht a beauteous dove<br>In dogged hearts, of most unfeigned love,<br>Fraternal love the livery of a Saint<br>Being come in fashion though by sad constraint,<br>Which if it thrive and prosper with us long<br>Will make New-England forty thousand strong.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>But off the Table hand, let this suffice<br>As the abridgment of our miseryes.<br>If Mildew, Famine, Sword, and fired Townes,<br>If Slaughter, Captivating, Deaths and wounds,<br>If daily whippings once reform our wayes,<br>These all will issue in our Fathers Praise;<br>If otherwise, the sword must never rest<br>Till all New-Englands Glory it divest.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Benjamin+Tompson">Benjamin Tompson</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=350820" data-title="New-Englands Crisis de Benjamin Tompson" data-description="IN seventy five the Critick of our years Commenc'd our war with Phillip and his peers. Whither the sun in Leo had inspir'd A feav'rish heat, and Pagan spirits fir'd? Whither some Romish Agent hatcht the plot? Or whither they themselves? appeareth ..."></div> </div> </div>

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