In a bracket mortised,
Like a bust with fractured head
Of some lady delicate,
Stands the Delawarean State.
Counties, three, are all her own,
Rising like a triple stone;
Down her profile like her hair
Showers the golden Delaware.
In her lids, retiring shy,
Brown NewCastle is her eye;
In the ocean's ewer thrust
Rosy Lewes tips her bust.
In her throat's slim interval
Dover is her capital,
Like a modest brooch within
Velvet recess of her chin.
From its agate to the bay
Ribbons a soft creek away,
Through the lotos lily ponds
And the marshes' diamonds.
Humid in the groves it stands,
Like some town in Netherlands,
Rising steepled o'er the fen —
A mirage of Hindlopen.
As within the locket's lid
Him, the lady loved, is hid,
Delaware, her face demure,
Shows in Dover's miniature:
Edmond Andros wigged so grand,
Francis Lovelace granting land,
Royal York and William Penn
And the Calvert gentlemen.
While the Dutchman trapped for furs,
Here were glebe and worshippers
Whilst the separate State began,
In the fresh years of Queen Anne.
And the sheriff set his stocks
In St. Jones's splatterdocks;
When its rent it would not pay
The Assembly drove away.
In his marshes wrote with grace.
By his cornered fireplace,
Dickinson, with eagle wing,
" Farmer's Letters " for the King.
Here the bell, like falchion keen,
Rang the soldiers to the green,
Who, erewhile, to court had come
At the beating of the drum.
Like a trumpet of his Lord's
Guarded by the gentry's swords,
Preached the schoolhouse steps upon
" Tory " Freeborn Garrettson.
Barratt's chapel was the lists,
Where old Wesley's Methodists
Bishops did themselves create,
In a new Episcopate.
Whatcoat's grave is in the town.
Bassett, convert of renown,
(Landed statesman in the strife,)
Bayard gave his child to wife.
Found by Presbyterian kirks
Are the heroes and their works,
With the Irish and the Scot
And their kindred Huguenot.
Every nook its own equips —
Jones, McDonough fought their ships
With the country-hearted air
Breathed in sylvan Delaware.
Like the gamecock first to crow,
While imperial States were slow,
Delaware her blessing sent
To a Federal government.
Count de Segur bringing gold,
Peeped on Dover's sleep, and told:
Marshal Grouchy, gunning through,
Shot more than at Waterloo.
Through our borders making tours,
Here came Du Pont de Nemours,
With his sons Lavoisier taught
To make powder full of thought.
Straight as it were almost new,
The cool house of Quaker Chew
Echoes more than war's renown
Round his hall at Germantown:
Not his daughters, royal fine,
Not his old Madeira wine,
But all filial war's surcease:
Clayton's, Bulwer's solemn peace.
Clayton to young Fisher there
Told the lore of Delaware;
Local-hearted was his breast
As the fishhawk to its nest.
Bayards four, to Senates sent,
From the rented State house went.
Cross the square, unspeaking, three
Rival brothers Saulsbury!
Who shall know a magazine
Crept to print on Dover green?
Or that Smithers, lawyer prim,
Here composed in Latin hymn?
Or that jurist Ridgelys sank
Sterling talents in a bank?
And, her Blue Hen's chickens canned,
Dover gave the world her brand.
Surgery its native realms
Founded under Dover elms
And, its green retreats within,
Letters gave to medicine.
Delaware's tranquil increase
Comes from times of Prince Maurice,
Fragment of their soul's concern —
Grotius and Oxenstiern.
Down her creek ports from the ways
Glide her sloops, where cattle graze.
Ever fattening, never gone,
On Van Rembrandt's river lawn.
Jurisprudence of its courts
Dignified by its reports;
By its Senators sustained
The equality it gained.
Not the fractious rights of States
Riots in her water gates;
Kirtled in her slender zone,
Daughter of our Union.
Ancient blendings in her type
Give her beauty rare and ripe,
All of Europe's races born
In the orient of her morn.
Wanton cities spoil her not;
Like her peach and apricot,
She, within her little tree,
as the Orchard's luxury.
Like a bust with fractured head
Of some lady delicate,
Stands the Delawarean State.
Counties, three, are all her own,
Rising like a triple stone;
Down her profile like her hair
Showers the golden Delaware.
In her lids, retiring shy,
Brown NewCastle is her eye;
In the ocean's ewer thrust
Rosy Lewes tips her bust.
In her throat's slim interval
Dover is her capital,
Like a modest brooch within
Velvet recess of her chin.
From its agate to the bay
Ribbons a soft creek away,
Through the lotos lily ponds
And the marshes' diamonds.
Humid in the groves it stands,
Like some town in Netherlands,
Rising steepled o'er the fen —
A mirage of Hindlopen.
As within the locket's lid
Him, the lady loved, is hid,
Delaware, her face demure,
Shows in Dover's miniature:
Edmond Andros wigged so grand,
Francis Lovelace granting land,
Royal York and William Penn
And the Calvert gentlemen.
While the Dutchman trapped for furs,
Here were glebe and worshippers
Whilst the separate State began,
In the fresh years of Queen Anne.
And the sheriff set his stocks
In St. Jones's splatterdocks;
When its rent it would not pay
The Assembly drove away.
In his marshes wrote with grace.
By his cornered fireplace,
Dickinson, with eagle wing,
" Farmer's Letters " for the King.
Here the bell, like falchion keen,
Rang the soldiers to the green,
Who, erewhile, to court had come
At the beating of the drum.
Like a trumpet of his Lord's
Guarded by the gentry's swords,
Preached the schoolhouse steps upon
" Tory " Freeborn Garrettson.
Barratt's chapel was the lists,
Where old Wesley's Methodists
Bishops did themselves create,
In a new Episcopate.
Whatcoat's grave is in the town.
Bassett, convert of renown,
(Landed statesman in the strife,)
Bayard gave his child to wife.
Found by Presbyterian kirks
Are the heroes and their works,
With the Irish and the Scot
And their kindred Huguenot.
Every nook its own equips —
Jones, McDonough fought their ships
With the country-hearted air
Breathed in sylvan Delaware.
Like the gamecock first to crow,
While imperial States were slow,
Delaware her blessing sent
To a Federal government.
Count de Segur bringing gold,
Peeped on Dover's sleep, and told:
Marshal Grouchy, gunning through,
Shot more than at Waterloo.
Through our borders making tours,
Here came Du Pont de Nemours,
With his sons Lavoisier taught
To make powder full of thought.
Straight as it were almost new,
The cool house of Quaker Chew
Echoes more than war's renown
Round his hall at Germantown:
Not his daughters, royal fine,
Not his old Madeira wine,
But all filial war's surcease:
Clayton's, Bulwer's solemn peace.
Clayton to young Fisher there
Told the lore of Delaware;
Local-hearted was his breast
As the fishhawk to its nest.
Bayards four, to Senates sent,
From the rented State house went.
Cross the square, unspeaking, three
Rival brothers Saulsbury!
Who shall know a magazine
Crept to print on Dover green?
Or that Smithers, lawyer prim,
Here composed in Latin hymn?
Or that jurist Ridgelys sank
Sterling talents in a bank?
And, her Blue Hen's chickens canned,
Dover gave the world her brand.
Surgery its native realms
Founded under Dover elms
And, its green retreats within,
Letters gave to medicine.
Delaware's tranquil increase
Comes from times of Prince Maurice,
Fragment of their soul's concern —
Grotius and Oxenstiern.
Down her creek ports from the ways
Glide her sloops, where cattle graze.
Ever fattening, never gone,
On Van Rembrandt's river lawn.
Jurisprudence of its courts
Dignified by its reports;
By its Senators sustained
The equality it gained.
Not the fractious rights of States
Riots in her water gates;
Kirtled in her slender zone,
Daughter of our Union.
Ancient blendings in her type
Give her beauty rare and ripe,
All of Europe's races born
In the orient of her morn.
Wanton cities spoil her not;
Like her peach and apricot,
She, within her little tree,
as the Orchard's luxury.