"The Slave in the Dismal Swamp" By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Poems on Slavery, and Voices of the Night; By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1842

The Slave in the Dismal Swamp 

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1842

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!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882)

After publishing Poems on Slavery in 1842, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) supported Senator Charles Sumner’s legislative efforts to end slavery, communicated with like-minded friends and colleagues through his correspondence, clubs, and other social gatherings, and used his growing

influence and financial resources to quietly assist abolitionists and slaves seeking freedom. Richard Henry Dana, Jr., Charles Sumner, James Russell Lowell, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Lydia Maria Child, Susan Hillard, Lunsford Lane, Josiah Henson, and others shared Longfellow’s anguish about ending slavery in the United States. (source: The National Park Service)