uaker, and that denomination, influenced by the preaching of John
Woolman and others, had long since quietly abolished slavery within its
own communion. The Quakers of Philadelphia and elsewhere took an
earnest though peaceful part in the Garrisonian movement. But it was a
strange irony of fate that had made the fiery-hearted Whittier a
friend. His poems against slavery and disunion have the martial ring
of a Tyrtaeus or a Koerner, added to the stern religious zeal of
Cromwell's Ironsides. They are like the sound of the trumpet blown
before the walls of Jericho, or the psalms of David denouncing woe upon
the enemies of God's chosen people. If there is any purely Puritan
strain in American poetry it is in the war-hymns of the Quaker "Hermit
of Amesbury." Of these patriotic poems there were three principal
collections: _Voices of Freedom_, 1849; _The Panorama, and Other
Poems_, 1856; and _In War Time_, 1863. Whittier's work as the poet of
freedom was done when, on hearing the bells ring for the passage of the
constitutional amendment abolishing slavery, he wrote his splendid
_Laus Deo_, thrilling with the ancient Hebrew spirit:

"Loud and long
Lift the old exulting song,
Sing with Miriam by the sea--
He has cast the mighty down,
Horse and rider sink and drown,
He hath triumphed gloriously."

Of his poems distinctly relating to the events of the civil war, the
best, or at all events the most popular, is _Barbara Frietchie_.
_Ichabod_, expressing the indignation of the Free Soilers at Daniel
Webster's seventh of March speech in defense of the Fugitive Slave Law,
is one of Whittier's best political poems, and not altogether unworthy
of comparison with Browning's _Lost Leader_. The language of
Whittier's warlike lyrics is biblical, and many of his purely
devotional pieces are religious poetry of a high order and have been
included in numerous collections of hymns. Of his songs of faith and
doubt, the best are perhaps _Our Master_, _Chapel of the Hermits_, and
_Eternal Goodness_; one stanza from the last of which is familiar;

"I know not where his islands lift
Their fronded palms in air,
I only know I cannot drift,
Beyond his love and care."

But from politics and war Whittier turned gladly to sing the homely
life of the New England country-side. His rural ballads and idyls are
as genuinely American as any thing that our poets have written, and
have been recommended, as such