“Farewell to the mountains whose mazes to me
Were more beautiful far than Eden could be;
No fruit was forbidden, but Nature had spread
Her bountiful board, and her children were fed.
The hills were our garners—our herds wildly grew
And Nature was shepherd and husbandman too.
I felt like a monarch, yet thought like a man,
As I thanked the Great Giver, and worshiped his plan.
“The home I forsake where my offspring arose;
The graves I forsake where my children repose.
The home I redeemed from the savage and wild;
The home I have loved as a father his child;
The corn that I planted, the fields that I cleared,
The flocks that I raised, and the cabin I reared;
The wife of my bosom—Farewell to ye all!
In the land of the stranger I rise or I fall.
“Farewell to my country! I fought for thee well,
When the savage rushed forth like the demons from hell.
In peace or in war I have stood by thy side—
My country, for thee I have lived, would have died!
But I am cast off, my career now is run,
And I wander abroad like the prodigal son—
Where the wild savage roves, and the broad prairies spread,
The fallen—despised—will again go ahead.”
We can not follow our hero—for he was a moral hero—in his adventures
while going across the country to Texas. Only one incident have we
room for. On the way he rode apace with a circuit preacher, a man not
less a hardy adventurer than himself. He narrates this:
“We talked about politics, religion, and nature,
farming, and bear-hunting, and the many blessings that
an all-bountiful Providence had bestowed upon our
happy country. He continued to talk on this subject,
traveling over the whole ground, as it were, until
his imagination glowed, and his soul became full to
overflowing; and he checked his horse, and I stopped
mine also, and a stream of eloquence burst forth from
his aged lips, such as I have seldom listened to:
it came from the overflowing fountain of a pure and
grateful heart. We were alone in the wilderness, but as
he proceeded, it seemed to me as if the tall trees bent
their tops to listen; that the mountain stream laughed
out joyfully as it bounded on like some living thing;
that the fading flowers of autumn smiled, and sent
forth their fresher fragrance, as if conscious that
they would revive in spring; and even the sterile rocks
seemed to be endued with some mysterious influence. We
were alone in the wilderness, but all things told me
that God was there. The thought renewed my strength and
courage. I had left my country, felt somewhat like an
outcast, believed that I had been neglected and lost
sight of. But I was now conscious that there was one
watchful eye over me; no matter whether I dwelt in
the populous cities, or threaded the pathless forests
alone; no matter whether I stood in the high places
among men, or made my solitary lair in the untrodden
wild, that eye was still upon me. My very soul leaped
joyfully at the thought. I never felt so grateful in
all my life. I never loved my God so sincerely in all
my life. I felt that I still had a friend.
“When the old man finished, I found that my eyes were
wet with tears. I approached and pressed his hand, and
thanked him, and says I, ‘Now let us take a drink.’ I
set him the example, and he followed it, and in a style
too that satisfied me, that if he had ever belonged
to the temperance society, he had either renounced
membership, or obtained a dispensation.”
Crockett reached Texas just in time to take part with the American
filibusters in the famous defense of the fortress of the Alamo, against
Santa Anna’s army. On the 6th of March, 1836, the citadel was carried
by the Mexicans by assault, only six of the little garrison surviving,
of whom Crockett was one. When captured he stood at bay in an angle of
the fort, his shattered rifle in one hand and a bloody bowie-knife in
the other; twenty Mexicans, dead or dying, were at his feet. His face
was covered with blood flowing from a deep gash across his forehead.
Santa Anna ordered the prisoners to be put to the sword. Crockett,
hearing the order, though entirely unarmed, sprang like a tiger at the
throat of the Mexican general, but a dozen swords interrupted him and
cut off his life.
Thus in its prime was thrown away a life that in many respects was
one of the most extraordinary in our annals. If he had enjoyed early
advantages, he would have been one of the greatest of Americans.
Nay, it is possible that if he had not been so deeply wounded by
ingratitude, treachery and defeat, and had remained at home, he,
instead of General Harrison, would have been the one to lead the
popular revolution, when came the reaction from the unlicensed _regime_
of Jackson and Van Buren.
David Crockett’s courage, independence, honesty, goodness of heart,
made him shine “like a good deed in a naughty world.” He ought not
to be forgotten by his countrymen, for a noble illustration of the
capabilities that may be found among the common people, and of the
career possible to even the lowliest-born American citizen.
* * * * *
WHEN a man is called feeble, what is meant by the expression?
Feebleness denotes a relative state; a relative state of the being to
whom it is applied. He whose strength exceeds his necessities, though
an insect, a worm, is a strong being; he whose necessities exceed his
strength, though an elephant, a lion, a conqueror, a hero, though a
god, is a feeble being.—ROUSSEAU.