Robinson Of Leyden

He sleeps not here; in hope and prayer     His wandering flock had gone before,     But he, the shepherd, might not share     Their sorrows on the wintry shore.     Before the Speedwell's anchor swung,     Ere yet the Mayflower's sail was spread,     While round his feet the Pilgrims clung,     The pastor spake, and thus he said: -     "Men, brethren, sisters, children dear!     God calls you hence from over sea;     Ye may not build by Haerlem Meer,     Nor yet along the Zuyder-Zee.     "Ye go to bear the saving word     To tribes unnamed and shores untrod;     Heed well the lessons ye have heard     From those old teachers taught of God.     "Yet think not unto them was lent     All light for all the coming days,     And Heaven's eternal wisdom spent     In making straight the ancient ways;     "The living fountain overflows     For every flock, for every lamb,     Nor heeds, though angry creeds oppose     With Luther's dike or Calvin's dam."     He spake; with lingering, long embrace,     With tears of love and partings fond,     They floated down the creeping Maas,     Along the isle of Ysselmond.     They passed the frowning towers of Briel,     The "Hook of Holland's" shelf of sand,     And grated soon with lifting keel     The sullen shores of Fatherland.     No home for these! - too well they knew     The mitred king behind the throne; -     The sails were set, the pennons flew,     And westward ho! for worlds unknown.     And these were they who gave us birth,     The Pilgrims of the sunset wave,     Who won for us this virgin earth,     And freedom with the soil they gave.     The pastor slumbers by the Rhine, -     In alien earth the exiles lie, -     Their nameless graves our holiest shrine,     His words our noblest battle-cry!     Still cry them, and the world shall hear,     Ye dwellers by the storm-swept sea!     Ye have not built by Haerlem Meer,     Nor on the land-locked Zuyder-Zee!