LiederNet logo

CONTENTS

×
  • Home | Introduction
  • Composers (20,028)
  • Text Authors (19,311)
  • Go to a Random Text
  • What’s New
  • A Small Tour
  • FAQ & Links
  • Donors
  • DONATE

UTILITIES

  • Search Everything
  • Search by Surname
  • Search by Title or First Line
  • Search by Year
  • Search by Collection

CREDITS

  • Emily Ezust
  • Contributors (1,112)
  • Contact Information
  • Bibliography

  • Copyright Statement
  • Privacy Policy

Follow us on Facebook

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807 - 1882)

She dwells by Great Kenhawa's side
Language: English 
She dwells by Great Kenhawa's side,
  In valleys green and cool;
And all her hope and all her pride
  Are in the village school. 

Her soul, like the transparent air
  That robes the hills above,
Though not of earth, encircles there
  All things with arms of love. 

And thus she walks among her girls
  With praise and mild rebukes;
Subduing e'en rude village churls
  By her angelic looks. 

She reads to them at eventide
  Of One who came to save;
To cast the captive's chains aside
  And liberate the slave. 

And oft the blessed time foretells
  When all men shall be free;
And musical, as silver bells,
  Their falling chains shall be. 

And following her beloved Lord,
  In decent poverty,
She makes her life one sweet record
  And deed of charity. 

For she was rich, and gave up all
  To break the iron bands
Of those who waited in her hall,
  And labored in her lands. 

Long since beyond the Southern Sea
  Their outbound sails have sped,
While she, in meek humility,
  Now earns her daily bread. 

It is their prayers, which never cease,
  That clothe her with such grace;
Their blessing is the light of peace
  That shines upon her face.

About the headline (FAQ)

Text Authorship:

  • by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807 - 1882), "The good part", appears in Poems on Slavery, first published 1842 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

  • by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875 - 1912), "She dwells by Great Kenhawa's side", op. 54 no. 2, published 1904 [ SATB chorus and piano or orchestra ], from Three Choral Ballads, no. 2 [sung text not yet checked]

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

  • RUS Russian (Русский) (Mikhail Larionovich Mikhailov) , "Благая часть, яже не отымется", first published 1861


Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2008-06-10
Line count: 36
Word count: 202

Gentle Reminder

This website began in 1995 as a personal project by Emily Ezust, who has been working on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has never had any government or institutional funding, so if you found the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!
–Emily Ezust, Founder

Donate

We use cookies for internal analytics and to earn much-needed advertising revenue. (Did you know you can help support us by turning off ad-blockers?) To learn more, see our Privacy Policy. To learn how to opt out of cookies, please visit this site.

I acknowledge the use of cookies

Contact
Copyright
Privacy

Copyright © 2025 The LiederNet Archive

Site redesign by Shawn Thuris