THE SLAVE IN A DISMAL SWAMP

This poem by Longfellow was quoted by Harriet Beecher Stowe in A KEY TO UNCLE TOM'S CABIN (1853), p.86, where she discusses outlaw slaves, who have escaped into the Dismal Swamp of North Carolina. We read "Evangeline" in junior high. Not any of Longfellow like this gripping Poetry! http://www.hwlongfellow.org/poems_poem.php?pid=99 The Slave in the Dismal Swamp Poems on Slavery 1842 The Good Part, That Shall Not Be Taken Away The Quadroon Girl The Slave in the Dismal Swamp The Slave Singing at Midnight The Warning The Witnesses To William E. Channing In dark fens of the Dismal Swamp The hunted Negro lay; He saw the fire of the midnight camp, And heard at times a horse's tramp And a bloodhound's distant bay. Where will-o'-the-wisps and glow-worms shine, In bulrush and in brake; Where waving mosses shroud the pine, And the cedar grows, and the poisonous vine Is spotted like the snake; Where hardly a human foot could pass, Or a human heart would dare, On the quaking turf of the green morass He crouched in the rank and tangled grass, Like a wild beast in his lair. A poor old slave, infirm and lame; Great scars deformed his face; On his forehead he bore the brand of shame, And the rags, that hid his mangled frame, Were the livery of disgrace. All things above were bright and fair, All things were glad and free; Lithe squirrels darted here and there, And wild birds filled the echoing air With songs of Liberty! On him alone was the doom of pain, From the morning of his birth; On him alone the curse of Cain Fell, like a flail on the garnered grain, And struck him to the earth!