The Star Spangled Banner

NEW VERSION OF THE NATIONAL SONG. The Star Spangled Banner. BY E. A. ATLEE. Oh say, do ye hear, at the dawn's early light, The shrieks of those Bondmen, whose blood is now streaming From the merciless lash, while our Banner in sigh, With its stars, mocking Freedom is fitfully gleaming? Do ye see the backs bare, do ye mark every score Of the whip of the driver trace channels of gore: And say, doth our Star Spangled Banner yet wave O'er the land of the Free and the home of the Brave? On the shore dimly seen thro' the mists of the deep, Where African's race in false safety reposes; What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep As it headlessly sweeps, half conceals, half discloses? 'Tis a Slave ship that's seen, by the morning's first beam, And its tarnish'd reflection polutes now the stream: 'Tis our Star Spangled Banner,' O, when shall it wave O'er the land of the free, and the home of the Brave! And where is that Band, who so valiantly bore The havoc of war, and the battle's confusion, For Liberty's sweets? We shall know them no more; Their fame is eclips'd by foul Slavery's pollution. No refuge is found on our unhallow'd ground, For the wretched in Slavery's manacles bound. While our Star Spangl'd Banner, in vain boasts to wave O'er the land of the Free, and the home of the Brave. Shall we ne'er hail the day, when as freemen we shall stand, The millions who groan under matchless oppression? Shall Liberty's shouts, in our heav'n-rescued land, Ne'er be shar'd by the slave in our blood guilty nation? Oh, let us be just, e'er in God we dare trust, Else the day will o'ertake us, when perid we must; And our Star Spangled Banner at half mast shall wave O'er the death bed of Freedom -- the home of the Slave Battle Creek, Michigan.