Where silver hairs no reverence meet,
Where to the weary stranger's feet
To cross the threshold 'tis denied.
And at the genial board, her place
No kerchief'd matron takes to grace
Her savage husband's haughty side;
Where Niger hides, or on the shore
Of dark and stormy Labrador.
O Castres,--I with thee would rove,
And, blest, thus wand'ring, if my mind
Could leave her galling bonds behind;
The bonds of an unworthy love.
Not like a Gambian slave that fled
(Of the pale Creole's lash in dread)
From Rio, strives in fearful haste
The mountain's woody side to gain;
But with him drags the clinking chain,
Lock'd at his waist or ancle fast.