Hannah More

The Black Slave Trade

pp. 99-110

[edited by] Marcus Wood., (2003) The poetry of slavery : an Anglo-American anthology, 1764-1865 Oxford University
Press

Staff and students of University of York are reminded that copyright subsists in this extract and the work from which it was
taken. This Digital Copy has been made under the terms of a CLA licence which allows you to:

• access and download a copy;

• print out a copy;

Please note that this material is for use ONLY by students registered on the course of study as stated in the section
below. All other staff and students are only entitled to browse the material and should not download and/or print out
a copy.

This Digital Copy and any digital or printed copy supplied to or made by you under the terms of this Licence are for use in
connection with this Course of Study. You may retain such copies after the end of the course, but strictly for your own
personal use.

All copies (including electronic copies) shall include this Copyright Notice and shall be destroyed and/or deleted if and
when required by University of York.

Except as provided for by copyright law, no further copying, storage or distribution (including by e-mail) is permitted
without the consent of the copyright holder.

The author (which term includes artists and other visual creators) has moral rights in the work and neither staff nor students
may cause, or permit, the distortion, mutilation or other modification of the work, or any other derogatory treatment of it,
which would be prejudicial to the honour or reputation of the author.

Course of Study: Yxxxx-005128 - Debating Global Literature and Culture

Title: The poetry of slavery : an Anglo-American anthology, 1764-1865
Name of Author: [edited by] Marcus Wood.
Name of Publisher: Oxford University Press
 HANNAH MORE 99

BURA
The barren beach, ye sons of rapine, prize;
Yes fertile fields and groves shall meet our eyes.
Say what are all your treasures brought from far,
But vice, intemp'rance, and a rage for war?
Then, Zelma, haste! to distant wilds we bend;
Content and peace shall on our steps attend.

Hannah More (1745-1833), The Black Slave Trade:

A Poem (originally published as Slavery: A Poem,1788);
The Sorrows of ramba; or, The Negro Woman's Lamentation
(1795); The Feast of Freedom; or, The Abolition
of Domestic Slavery in Ceylon (1816)

More, like Chatterton, grew up in and around Bristol when it was one of the world's
biggest slaving ports. She did not become interested in producing slavery literature,
however, until well on in her career. In the early 17705 through an introduction to the
great actor and theatrical entrepreneur David Garrick she went to London where she
was introduced to Sir Joshua Reynolds and became a favourite of Dr Johnson. During
the late 177os More began literary production in earnest, writing ballads and plays. Her
tragedy Percy was hugely successful both on the stage and as a text. When Garrick died
in 1779 it was something of a watershed for her, and More backed off from the fashion-
able London literary scene. She rejected the theatre on moral grounds and began to
produce polemical and didactic writings aimed at teaching Tory politics and Evangeli-
cal morals to children and the British labouring poor. Her exposure to John Newton's
writings (pp. 77-80) and then in the late 178os to his sermons was the single force most
responsible for making More seriously interested in the slave trade. In 1787 she was
introduced to Wilberforce just as he was throwing himself into the orchestration of
the political activities of the abolitionists and they became fast friends and abolition
collaborators. It was at this point that More wrote Slavery: A Poem.
Abolition for More was, as it was for Wilberforce, merely one area of social reform
within a far bigger project. During the 1790s More threw herself into producing loyalist
propaganda directed against French jacobinism. She wrote and published more than
fifty titles between 1794 and 1797. These 'Cheap Repository Tracts' were supported
and printed by the Loyalist Associations and distributed in several million copies
across the country. More's 'Tracts' set out to defend the established Church and the
aristocracy against the claims of die English radicals, and particularly Tom Paine's
100 HANNAH MORE

arguments in The Rights of Man ridiculing privilege and its insti tutions. The 'Tracts'
attempted to persuade the poor that they should show obedience, respect, and above
all gratitude to the local clergy and the squirearchy. More took a v ery similar line on the
attitudes which black Afro-Caribbean, and later Indian, slaves should show to their
white 'liberators'. More's slaves may be lavishly pitied in the abstract, but they must
remain passive, and above all good Christians. Both The Sorrows of Yamba and The
Feast of Freedom are powerful demonstrations that for More it was axiomatic that a free
slave become a subservient Christian slave.
More maintained close links with Wilberforce, and continued to support slavery
abolition as a cause after the trade was abolished in 1807. As late a!,1816 she penned The
Feast of Freedom which was translated into a variety of south Indian languages, as well
as being translated by Buddhist monks and circulated in Ceylon. This ecstatic celebra-
tion of British imperial patriarchy is also an uncompromising elaboration of the polic-
ing role of Christianity within Empire. In becoming simultaneously emancipated and
Christianized the slave swaps one master for another, or as More succinctly summar-
izes: 'We'll show that we indeed are free, I Because we serve the Lord.' In this poem
More goes so far as to argue that the Sinhalese will now willinOy give all their trade
goods to Britain as a literal trade-off for having been given access to Christianity. The
sinister links between Evangelical missionary fervour and British imperial ambition
could hardly be more straightforwardly set out.
More's work continues to be sidelined. The recently reconstructed Anglo-
American-female-Romantic poetic canon has not easily found place for More. Her
unwavering patriarchalism, and her belief first in the subservient role of women, and
secondly in the innate inferiority of all non-white non-British p( oples, have not made
her immediately attractive to late twentieth-century editors in search of proto-feminist
icons. Yet More is a typical case of a once highly influential author who must now be
read precisely because her assumptions regarding race, slavcry, religion, and the
economics of Empire are so far removed from the catechisms of o)ntemporary Western
liberalism. More's abolition verse was massively popular, and is the most fluent and
intellectually the most hidebound verse to come out of mainstream state-backed
Evangelical abolition. Both The Sorrows of Yamba (first publish( d as one of the Cheap
Repository Tracts) and Slavery: A Poem encapsulate the assumptions upon which
Clapham sect abolition was founded.
Textual note: The publishing history and authorship of The Sorrows of Yamba are
complicated. More did not sign the poem Z, her normal way of ndicating her author-
ship within the multi-authored Cheap Repository Tracts. It has recently been convin-
cingly argued that the first part of the narrative was composed by a little-known poet
called Eaglesfield Smith, who submitted the poem to More for publication in the
Tracts. More then emended the poem, the most important chan e being the inclusion
of the long missionary conversion narrative. For a detailed account see Srinivas
Aravamudan (ed.), Slavery, Abolition and Emancipation: Writings in the British
Romantic Period (Pickering & Chau°, 1999), 224.
 HANNAH MORE 101

The Black Slave Trade: A Poem

—0 great design!
Ye Sons of Mercy! 0 complete your work;
Wrench from Oppression's hand the iron rod,
And bid the cruel feel the pains they give.
—Thompson's "Liberty"

If Heaven has into being deign'd to call

Thy light, 0 LIBERTY! to shine on all;
Bright intellectual Sun! why does thy ray
To earth distribute only partial day?
Since no resisting cause from spirit flows
Thy universal presence to oppose;
No obstacles by Nature's hand impress'd.
Thy subtle and ethereal beams arrest;
Not sway'd by matter is thy course benign.
Or more direct or more oblique to shine;
Nor motion's laws can speed thy active course;
Nor strong repulsion's pow'rs obstruct thy force:
Since there is no convexity in MIND.
Why are thy genial rays to parts confin'd?
While the chill North with thy bright beam is blest,
Why should fell darkness half the South invest?
Was it decreed, fair Freedom! at thy birth,
That thou should'st ne'er irradiate all the earth?
While Britain basks in thy full blaze of light,
Why lies sad Afric quench'd in total night?
Thee only, sober Goddess! I attest,
In smiles chastis'd, and decent graces dress'd;
To thee alone, pure daughter of the skies.
The hallow'd incense of the Bard should rise:
Not that mad Liberty,' in whose wild praise
Too oft he trims his prostituted bays;
Not that unlicens'd monster of the crowd,
Whose roar terrific bursts in peals so loud,
Deaf 'ning the ear of Peace; fierce Faction's tool,
Of rash Sedition born, and mad Misrule;
The epigraph is by James Thompson (1700-48), whose most renowned poem The Seasons con-
tained a famous attack on the slave trade.
'"Mad Liberty", alluding to the riots in London in the year 'Soo.' [More]
102 HANNAH MORE

Whose stubborn mouth, rejecting Reason's rein,

No strength can govern, and no skill restrain;
Whose magic cries the frantic vulgar draw
To spurn at Order, and to outrage Law;
To tread on grave Authority and Pow'r,
And shake the work of ages in an hour:
Convuls'd her voice, and pestilent her breath,
She raves of mercy, while she deals out death:
Each blast is fate; she darts from either hand
Red conflagration o'er di' astonish'd land;
Clamouring for peace, she rends the air with nc ise,
And, to reform a part, the whole destroys.
Reviles oppression only to oppress,
And, in the act of murder, breathes redress.
Such have we seen on Freedom's genuine coast,
Bellowing for blessings which were never lost.
'Tis past, and Reason rules the lucid hour,
And beauteous ORDER reassumes his power:
Lord of the bright ascendant may he reign,
Till perfect Peace eternal sway maintain!
0. plaintive Southerne!3 whose impassion'd page
Can melt the soul to grief, or rouse to rage;
Now, when congenial themes engage the Muse.
She burns to emulate thy generous views;
Her failing efforts mock her fond desires,
She shares thy feelings, not partakes thy fires.
Strange pow'r of song! the strain that warms tho heart
Seems the same inspiration to impart;
Touch'd by th' extrinsic energy alone,
We think the flame which melts us is our own;
Deceiv'd, for genius we mistake delight,
Charrn'd as we read, we fancy we can write.
Though not to me, sweet Bard, thy pow'rs belong,
The cause I plead shall sanctify my song.
The Muse awakes no artificial fire,
For Truth rejects what Fancy would inspire:
Here Art would weave her gayest flow'rs in vaiii,
The bright invention Nature would disdain.

"Author of Oroonoko.' [More] Thomas Southerne (166o-1746) based his 1696 dramatic tragedy
on a novella by Aphra Behn, Oroonolto , a romance focused on slave revolt in Surinam.
 HANNAH MORE 103

For no fictitious ills these numbers flow,

But living anguish, and substantial woe;
No individual griefs my bosom melt,
For millions feel what Oronoko felt:
Fir'd by no single wrongs, the countless host
I mourn, by rapine dragg'd from Afric's coast.
Perish th' illiberal thought which would debase
The native genius of the sable race!
Perish the proud philosophy, which sought
To rob them of the pow'rs of equal thought!
What! does th' immortal principle within
Change with the casual colour of a skin?
Does matter govern spirit? or is MIND
Degraded by the form to which 'tis join'd?
No: they have heads to think, and hearts to feel.
And souls to act, with firm, though erring zeal:
For they have keen affections, soft desires,
Love strong as death, and active patriot fires:
All the rude energy, the fervid flame
Of high-soul'd passion, and ingenuous shame:
Strong, but luxuriant virtues, boldly shoot
From the wild vigour of a savage root.
Nor weak their sense of honour's proud control,
For pride is virtue in a Pagan soul;
A sense of worth, a conscience of desert,
A high, unbroken haughtiness of heart;
That self-same stuff which erst proud empires sway'd,
Of which the conquerors of the world were made.
Capricious fate of men! that very pride
In Afric scourg'd, in Rome was deified.
No Muse, 0 Qua-shil4 shall thy deeds relate,
No statue snatch thee from oblivious fate!

'"It is a point of honour among Negroes of a high spirit to die rather than to suffer their glossy skin
to bear the mark of the whip. Qua-shi had somehow offended his master, a young planter, with whom he
had been bred up in the endearing intimacy of a play-fellow. His services had been faithful; his attach-
ment affectionate. The master resolved to punish him and pursued him for that purpose. In trying to
escape, Qua-shi stumbled and fell; the master fell upon him, they wrestled long and with doubtful vic-
tory, at length Qua-shi got uppermost, and, being fairly seated on his master's breast, he secured his legs
with one hand, and with the other drew a sharp knife: then said, 'Master, [have been bred up with you
from a child; I have loved you as myself; in return, you have condemned me to a punishment of which I
must ever have borne the marks—thus only I can avoid them;' so saying, he drew the knife with all his
strength across his own throat and fell down dead, without a groan, on his master's body." Ramsay's,
Essay on the Treatment of African slaves.' [Morel
104 HANNAH MORE

For thou wast born where never gentle Muse

On Valour's grave the flow'rs of Genius strews:
And thou wast born where no recording page
Plucks the fair deed from Time's devouring rage.
Had Fortune plac'd thee on some happier coast,
Where polish'd Pagans souls heroic boast,
To thee, who sought'st a voluntary grave,
Th' uninjur'd honours of thy name to save,
Whose generous arm thy barbarous Master spar'd,
Altars had smok'd, and temples had been rear'd.
Whene'er to Afric's shores I turn my eyes,
Horrors of deepest, deadliest guilt arise;
I see, by more than Fancy's mirror shown,
The burning village, and the blazing town:
See the dire victim torn from social life,
See the scar'd infant, hear the shrieking wife!
She, wretch forlorn! is dragg'd by hostile hand:;,
To distant tyrants sold, in distant lands:
Transmitted miseries, and successive chains,
The sole sad heritage her child obtains.
E'en this last wretched boon their foes deny,
To weep together, or together die.
By felon hands, by one relentless stroke,
See the fond vital links of Nature broke!
The fibres twisting round a parent's heart,
Torn from their grasp, and bleeding as they part.
Hold, murderers! hold! nor aggravate clistre:is;
Respect the passions you yourselves possess:
Ev'n you, of ruffian heart, and ruthless hand,
Love your own offspring, love your native land.
Ev'n you, with fond impatient feelings burn,
Though free as air, though certain of return.
Then, if to you, who voluntary roam,
So dear the memory of your distant home,
0 think how absence the lov'd scene endears
To him, whose food is groans, whose drink is tears;
Think on the wretch whose aggravated pains
To exile misery adds, to misery chains.
If warmyour heart, to British feelings true,
As dear his land to him as yours to you;
And Liberty, in you a hallow'd flame,
 HANNAH MORE 105

Burns, unextinguish'd, in his breast the same.

Then leave him holy Freedom's cheering smile,
The heav'n-taught fondness for the parent soil;
Revere affections mingled with our frame,
In every nature, every clime the same;
In all, these feelings equal sway maintain;
In all, the love of HOME and FREEDOM reign:
And Tempe's5 vale, and parch'd Angola's sand,
One equal fondness of their sons command.
Th' unconquer'd Savage laughs at pain and toil,
Basking in Freedom's beams which gild his native soil.
Does thirst of empire, does desire of fame,
(For these are specious crimes,) our rage inflame?
No: sordid lust of gold their fate controls,
The basest appetite of basest souls:
Gold, better gain'd by what their ripening sky,
Their fertile fields, their arts,6 and mines supply.
What wrongs, what injuries does Oppression plead,
To smooth the crime and sanctify the deed?
What strange offence, what aggravated sin?
They stand convicted—of a darker skin!
Barbarians, hold! th' opprobrious commerce spare,
Respect His sacred image which they bear.
Though dark and savage, ignorant and blind,
They claim the common privilege of kind;
Let Malice strip them of each other plea,
They still are men, and men should still be free.
Insulted Reason loathes th' inverted trade—
Loathes, as she views the human purchase made;
The outrag'd Goddess, with abhorrent eyes,
Sees MAN the traffic, Scams the merchandize!
Man, whom fair Commerce taught with judging eye,
And liberal hand, to barter or to buy,
Indignant Nature blushes to behold,
Degraded Man himself, truck'd, barter'd, sold;
Of ey'ry native privilege bereft,
Yet curs'd with ey'ry wounded feeling left.

o A sacred valley between the mountains of Olympus and Ossa in Thessaly, praised by poets as of
absolute beauty; Tempe is consequently associated with consummate loveliness.
o 'Besides many valuable productions of the soil, cloths and carpets of exquisite manufacture are
brought from the coast of Guinea.' [More]
 106 HANNAH MORE

Hard lot! each brutal suff 'ring to sustain,

Yet keep the sense acute of human pain.
Plead not, in reason's palpable abuse.
Their sense of feeling callous and obtuse:7
From heads to hearts lies Nature's plain appeal.
Though few can reason, all mankind can feel.
Though wit may boast a livelier dread of shame,
A loftier sense of wrong refinement claim;
Though polish'd manners may fresh wants invent,
And nice distinctions nicer souls torment;
Though these on finer spirits heavier fall,
Yet natural evils are the same to all.
Though wounds there are which reason's force may heal,
There needs no logic sure to make us feel.
The nerve, howe'er untutor'd, can sustain
A sharp, unutterable sense of pain;
As exquisitely fashion'd in a slave,
As where unequal fate a sceptre gave.
Sense is as keen where Gambia's waters glide,
As where proud Tiber rolls his classic tide.
Though verse or rhetoric point the feeling line,
They do not whet sensation, but define.
Did ever wretch less feel the galling chain,
When Zeno' prov'd there was no ill in pain?
In vain the sage to smooth its horror tries;
Spartans and Helots see with different eyes:
Their miseries philosophic quirks deride,
Slaves groan in pangs disown'd by Stoic pride.
When the fierce Sun darts vertical his beams,
And thirst and hunger mix their wild extremes;
When the sharp iron' wounds his inmost soul,
And his strain'd eyes in burning anguish roll;
Will the parch'd Negro own, ere he expire,
No pain in hunger, and no heat in fire?

'Nothing is more frequent than this cruel stupid argument, that they do not feel the miseries
inflicted on them as Europeans would do.' [More]
8 Greek philosopher who founded the Stoic school of philosophy.

9 'This is not said figuratively. The writer of these lines has seen a complete m t of chains fitted to every

separate limb of these unhappy, innocent, men; together with instruments for virenching open the jaws,
contrived with such ingenious cruelty as would gratify the tender mercies of an inquisitor.' [More] With
the ironic reference to the Inquisition More is typically buying into the Spanish 'Black Legend'.
 HANNAH MORE 107

For him, when agony his frame destroys.

What hope of present fame or future joys?
For that have Heroes shorten'd Nature's date;
For this have Martyrs gladly met their fate;
But him, forlorn, no Hero's pride sustains,
No Martyr's blissful visions soothe his pains;
Sullen, he mingles with his kindred dust,
For he has learn'd to dread the Christian's trust;
To him what mercy can that GOD display,
Whose servants murder, and whose sons betray?
Savage! thy venial error I deplore,
They are not Christians who invest thy shore.
0 thou sad spirit, whose preposterous yoke
The great deliverer Death, at length, has broke!
Releas'd from misery, and escap'd from care,
Go, meet that mercy man denied thee here.
In thy dark home, sure refuge of th' oppress'd,
The wicked vex not, and the weary rest.
And, if some notions, vague and undefin'd,
Of future terrors have assail'd thy mind;
If such thy masters have presum'd to teach,
As terrors only they are prone to preach;
(For should they paint eternal Mercy's reign,
Where were th' oppressor's rod, the captive's chain?)
If, then, thy troubled soul has learn'd to dread
The dark unknown thy trembling footsteps tread;
On Him, who made thee what thou art, depend;
HE, who withholds the means, accepts the end.
Thy mental night thy Saviour will not blame,
He died for those who never heard his name.
Not thine the reckoning dire of LIGHT abus'd,
KNOWLEDGE disgrac'd, and LIBERTY misus'd;
On thee no awful judge incens'd shall sit
For parts perverted, and dishonour'd wit.
Where ignorance will be found the safest plea,
How many learn'd and wise shall envy thee!
And thou, WHITE SAVAGE! whether lust of gold
Or lust of conquest rule thee uncontroll'd!
Hero, or robbed—by whatever name
Thou plead thy impious claim to wealth or fame;
108 HANNAH MORE

Whether inferior mischief be thy boast,

A tyrant trader rifling Congo's coast:
Or bolder carnage track thy crimson way,
Kings dispossess'd, and provinces thy prey;
Whether thou pant to tame earth's distant bound;
All Cortez'° murder'd, all Columbus found;
O'er plunder'd realms to reign, detested Lord,
Make millions wretched, and thyself abhorr'd:—
Whether Cartoucheu in forests break the law,
Or bolder Caesar keep the world in awe;
In Reason's eye, in Wisdom's fair account,
Your sum of glory boasts a like amount:
The means may differ, but the end's the same;
Conquest is pillage with a nobler name.
Who makes the sum of human blessings less,
Or sinks the stock of general happiness,
Though erring fame may grace, though false renown
His life may blazon or his memory crown,
Yet the last audit shall reverse the cause,
And God shall vindicate his broken laws.
Had those advent'rous spirits who explore
Through ocean's trackless wastes, the far-sought shore;
Whether of wealth insatiate, or ofpow'r,
Conquerors who waste, or ruffians who devour;
Had these possess'd, 0 Coox!I2 thy gentle mind,
Thy love of arts, thy love of human kind;
Had these pursued thy mild and liberal plan,
DISCOVERERS had not been a curse to man.
Then, bless'd Philanthropy! thy social hands
Had link'd dissever'd worlds in brothers' bands;
Careless, if colour, or if clime divide;
Then, lov'd and loving, man had liv'd, and died.
Then with pernicious skill we had not known
To bring their vices back and leave our own.

Heman Cortez, the legendary conquistador who invaded the Mexican empire and enslaved its
people. Cortex's actions in Mexico led to incalculable deaths among Mexican people.
" Louis Dominique Cartouche was a legendary criminal in early 18th-century France; he was even-
tually publicly executed in 1721.
James Cook (1728-79), the celebrated naval explorer, most commonly remembered for his voyages
round Australia and New Zealand.
 HANNAH MORE 109

The purest wreaths which hang on glory's shrine

For empires founded, peaceful PENN!" are thine;
No blood-stain'd laurels crown'd thy virtuous toil,
No slaughter'd natives drench'd thy fair-earn'd soil.
Still thy meek spirit in thy flock survives,
Consistent still, their doctrines rule their lives;
Thy followers only have effac'd the shame
Inscrib'd by SLAVERY on the Christian name.
Shall Britain, where the soul of Freedom reigns,
Forge chains for others she herself disdains?
Forbid it, Heaven! 0 let the nations know
The liberty she tastes she will bestow;
Not to herself the glorious gift confin'd,
She spreads the blessing wide as human kind;
And scorning narrow views of time and place,
Bids all be free in earth's extended space.
What page of human annals can record
A deed so bright as human rights restor'd?
0 may that god-like deed, that shining page
Redeem OUR fame, and consecrate OUR age,
And let this glory mark our favour'd shore,
TO curb FALSE FREEDOM and the TRUE restore!
And see the cherub MERCY from above,
Descending softly, quits the sphere of love!
On Britain's Isle she sheds her heavenly dew,
And breathes her spirit o'er th' enlighten'd few;
From soul to soul the generous influence steals,
Till every breast the soft contagion feels.
She speeds, exulting, to the burning shore,
With the best message Angel ever bore;
Hark! 'tis the note which spoke a Saviour's birth,
Glory to God on high, and peace on Earth!
She vindicates the Pow'r in Heaven ador'd,
She stills the clank of chains, and sheathes the sword;
She cheers the mourner, and with soothing hands
From bursting hearts unbinds th' Oppressor's bands;
Restores the lustre of the Christian name,
And clears the foulest blot that dimm'd its fame.

William Penn (1644-1718), early North American colonist who founded the modestly named Penn-
sylvania.
110 HANNAH MORE

As the mild Spirit hovers o'er the coast,

A fresher hue the wither'd landscapes boast;
Her healing smiles the ruin'd scenes repair.
And blasted Nature wears a joyous air:
While she proclaims through all their spicy groves,
"Henceforth your fruits, your labours, and your loves,
All that your Sires possess'd, or you have sown,
Sacred from plunder—all is now YOUR OWN."
And now, her high commission from above,
Starnp'd with the holy characters of love,
The meek-ey'd spirit waving in her hand,
Breathes manumission o'er the rescu'd land:
She tears the banner stain'd with blood and tears,
And, LIBERTY! thy shining standard rears!
As the bright ensign's glory she displays.
See pale OPPRESSION faints beneath the blaze!
The giant dies! no more his frown appals,
The chain, untouch'd, drops off, the fetter falls.
Astonish'd echo tells the vocal shore,
Oppression's fall'n, and Slavery is no more!
The dusky myriads crowd the sultry plain,
And hail that MERCY long invok'd in vain.
Victorious pow'r! she bursts their two-fold bands,
And FAITH and FREEDOM spring from Britain's hands.
And Trwu! great source of Nature and of Grace,
Who of one blood didst form the human race,
Look down in mercy in thy chosen time.
With equal eye on Afric's suff'ring clime:
Disperse her shades of intellectual night,
Repeat thy high behest—LET THERE BE LIGHT!
Bring each benighted soul, great GOD, to Thee,
And with thy wide Salvation make them free!

The Sorrows of Yamba; or, The Negro Woman's Lamentation

'In St. Lucie's' distant isle,
Still with Afric's love I burn;
Parted many a thousand mile,
Never, never to return.
' A variant name for the small Caribbean island of St Lucia.