Who presented to me, on my Seventy-second Birthday, February 27, 1879, this Chair made from the Wood of the Village Blacksmith's Chestnut Tree. LISTEN, my children, and you shall And a huge black hulk that was mag nified hear Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere, By its own reflection in the tide. On the eighteenth of April, in Sev enty-five; Hardly a man is now alive Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street, year. He said to his friend, "If the British march By land or sea from the town to-night, Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch Of the North Church Tower as a sig nal light, One, if by land, and two, if by sea; And I on the opposite shore will be, Ready to ride and spread the alarm Through every Middlesex village and farm, For the country folk to be up and to arm." Then he said, "Good night!" and with muffled oar Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore, Just as the moon rose over the bay, Where swinging wide at her moorings lay The Somerset, British man-of-war; spar Across the moon like a prison bar, Till in the silence around him he hears The muster of men at the barrack door, The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet, And the measured tread of the grenadiers, Marching down to their boats on the shore. Then he climbed the tower of the Old North Church, By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread, To the belfry-chamber overhead, And startled the pigeons from their perch On the sombre rafters, that round him made Masses and moving shapes of shade, By the trembling ladder, steep and tall, To the highest window in the wall, Where he paused to listen and look down A moment on the roofs of the town, And the moonlight flowing over all. |