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Show The Minute-Men of Northboro' (April 10, 1775) ' ' I 'lS noonday by the buttonhole, with slender-shadowed bud; -t 'Tis April by the Assabet, whose banks scarce hold his flood; When down the road from Marlboro' we hear a sound of speed A cracking whip and clanking hoofs a case of crying need! And there a dusty rider hastes to tell of flowing blood, Of troops afield, of war abroad, and many a desperate deed. . . . rTTHE Minute-Men of Northboro' let rust the standing plow, J- The seed may wait the fertile ground up-smiling to the spring They seize their guns and powder-horns; there is no halting now, At thought of homes made fatherless by order of the King. THE pewter-ware is melted into bullets long past due; The flints are picked, the powder's dry, the rifles shine like new. Within their Captain's yard enranked they hear the Parson's prayer Unto the God of armies for the battles they must share; He asks that to their Fathers and their Altars they be true, For Country and for Liberty unswervingly to dare. sj THE Minute-Men of Northboro' they boast no martial atrj No uniforms gleam in the sun where on and on they plodj But generations yet unborn their valor shall declare; They strike for Massachusetts Bay; they serve New England's God. HBj$fr-! THE hirelings who would make us slaves themselves are backward hurled, On Worcester and on Middlesex their flag's forever furled. Theirs was the glinting pomp of war; ours is the victors' prize; That day of bourgeoning has seen a race of freemen rise. A Nation born in fearlessness stands forth before the world With God her shield, the Right her sword, and Freedom in her eyes. Wallace Rice, in the Boston Herald |